New iBook with slow CD-R speed? Who else is having (or not having) this problem?

luca

I don't know if I posted about this before (I put it on a number of forums but maybe not here at AI), but I was wondering if anyone else was experiencing very slow burn speeds with their new iBook 800/Combo. I just got one a few weeks ago and from day one it's been burning CDs at 4x even though the drive is rated for 16x and the media is rated for 32x or even higher. I called Apple support about the issue and they claimed to not know about the problem. A few days later, after doing more trials and getting more information, I called back. The guy at support said that he was aware of the problem now and it was being worked on. Meanwhile, he had me go through a number of tests, including doing a Finder and iTunes burn and using Console to see how fast it burned. Not surprisingly, the burn speed remained at 4x even though I was using my brand new, direct from Apple, 48x Verbatim CD-R media. However, Console reported a burn speed of 12x one time and 16x the other. The time predictions iTunes made reflected a 12x burn, but each second took 3-4 seconds to tick down.



I have heard of many people having problems at the Apple Discussions. A few know others who have 800 MHz iBooks that don't have the problem. Since most people go to the Apple Discussions to report problems, I'm guessing there might be a big group of people who are getting perfect 16x burns and the 4x burning only affects a vocal minority of iBook owners.



If you have an 800 MHz iBook, please respond and let me know how fast it's actually burning CDs (the speed it claims it's burning at isn't necessarily correct, you will have to manually time it using a clock). Hopefully there will be some people without the problem, which would give me hope that Apple might be able to just replace my iBook and I'd have the issue resolved. Thanks for your response!

defiant

there is a KBase article about this problem <a href="http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=86186"; target="_blank">here</a>. (see, I don't forget you.)

luca

Thanks a lot Defiant, you're always helpful.



Well, usually helpful, or at least you try to be

luca

Dangit, I just read it, and it looks like they're trying to peg the blame on poor media. They can't do that! I specifically bought Verbatim media, the best you can get, straight from Apple! If I can't use the stuff that came with the computer, what do I use? <img src="graemlins/bugeye.gif" border="0" alt="[Skeptical]" /> <img src="graemlins/hmmm.gif" border="0" alt="[Hmmm]" /> :eek:

defiant

[quote]Originally posted by Luca Rescigno:

<strong>Well, usually helpful, or at least you try to be </strong><hr></blockquote>



if there wouldn't be a you would be