How do I finalize a disk (CD-R and DVD+/-R) using Windows ?

Hi Stephen_722,

If using a Windows process : (from my first reply in this thread on page 1)

Close or finalize a CD or DVDhttp://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows7/Close-or-finalize-a-CD-or-DVD

Excellent Forum for getting help with CD/DVD issues and programs

http://club.myce.com/

====================================================

If you are using a 3rd party program to burn a disc, such as iTunes, Roxio, or any

others then you need to check with their Support and/or forums (in any) for

methods specific to those programs. You can't mix methods.

Hope this helps.

Rob Brown - Microsoft MVP <- profile - Windows Expert - Consumer : Bicycle <- Mark Twain said it right!

Okay, are you saying the answer is "You can't finalize a CD or DVD using Windows Explorer"? People keep talking about closing a CD or DVD. Closing is not finalizing. If this is the answer, it sure took a lot of work to get here.

Hi,

From the notes section of the Link I posted above :

"Some programs might finalize your disc instead of closing the current session. You can't add any additional files to a disc that has been finalized. When you burn a CD or DVD using Windows Explorer, the disc is not finalized."

Rob - SpiritX

Hi:

Roixo's software ,e.g. Creator or BackUp MyPC may allow you to finalize a disk

but then you can only access the information burned, using THEIR software,

as if it is encrypted.

I have tried the links provided in the above responses not the follwoing one, yet ...

(Excellent Forum for getting help with CD/DVD issues and programs http://club.myce.com/)

but the information was of no value,  The suggetsions above did not work, or the information

was so generalized that it couldn't explain the difference in closing vs. finalizing a disk.

Roxis'a Tech Support (bulletin boards like this one) have had some helpful advice,

but it came down to that you could only recover the disk info using their software used

to burn the disk.

Windows DVD Maker has a drop-down menu that allows you to select if you want to burn

a Live disk or a Master disk (see below).

I have had the Live version fail on me alot, but it has worked for me several times.

It seems to fail, more, when trying to burn larger files.

Live Disk:

DVDs are supposed to have roughly 4.0 GB of free-space after formatting.

I burned a 1.7 GB file to these disks.  Then I tried buring backup copy of the same file

(with different name) to the same disk ... the disk had not been ejected, etc.... and the

attempted "burn" would fail.  I have been able to burn she backup file(s) to some DVDs,

though, but had to throw out MANY more disk that those create that were useable. 

The burn process would hang and then tell me that a file (or files), wasn't readable

(usually, these unreadle files may have consisted of had zero bytes in size), or the

program would just hang.  It tried doing Live burns using DVD +/- R and DVD +/-  RW

disks from several manufacturers, but had the same results.  Many failures

Master Disk:

I used the same process(es) described under Live Disk, but have neverbeen able to burn a succesful disk.  The process would always hang.

-DaleB