I have a several SunFire 100's with Teac CD-W224EA installed.  These systems
are used to acquire data that are periodically mkisofs'd into iso images
which are then written to CD via cdrw.  For reasons uknown to me, from time
to time a few of these systems (not all) will fail to initialize the device,
like so:

% cdrw -i image_file.iso
Looking for CD devices...
Initializing device...failed.
Cannot initialize device for write

This condition is consistently cleared following a reboot.

1. Any idea what is causing this?
2. Any ideas on how to prevent it?
3. Any ideas on how to reset the CD without having to reboot?

Thanks in advance!

David

" David E. Chavez" <Invalid AddressPleaseReplyToGroup@StupidSpamTricks.COM>
wrote in message news:brv8hj$gfb$1@news1.ucsd.edu...
> % cdrw -i image_file.iso
> Looking for CD devices...
> Initializing device...failed.
> Cannot initialize device for write
>
> This condition is consistently cleared following a reboot.
>
> 1. Any idea what is causing this?
> 2. Any ideas on how to prevent it?
> 3. Any ideas on how to reset the CD without having to reboot?
I use an IDE CD writere on an Ultra 10 and have seen exactly the same
behvaiour - the drive "fails" and from then on, the only "fix" is a reboot.
I have no fix, but have found a way to avoid the problem - every time I burn
a CD and it is ejected (by cdrw), I put a fresh, unwritten CD in there and
then close the tray. This is of course no fix, but I got tired of rebooting
all the time. It is also convenient to know that the machine always is ready
for a new cdrw session, since the U10 is located away from my office.

- EL

On Fri, 19 Dec 2003, it was written:
> I have a several SunFire 100's with Teac CD-W224EA installed.  These systems
> are used to acquire data that are periodically mkisofs'd into iso images
> which are then written to CD via cdrw.  For reasons uknown to me, from time
> to time a few of these systems (not all) will fail to initialize the device,
> like so:
>
> % cdrw -i image_file.iso
> Looking for CD devices...
> Initializing device...failed.
> Cannot initialize device for write
>
> This condition is consistently cleared following a reboot.
>
> 1. Any idea what is causing this?
I had similiar problem, check maybe device is used by vold?

> 2. Any ideas on how to prevent it?
Try to stop vold and cdrw as root.

> 3. Any ideas on how to reset the CD without having to reboot?
Try to stop vold.

Regards,
ASK

In article <9YFEb.7271$Y06.114085@news4.e.nsc.no>,
Erlend Leganger <elega@remove.this.online.no> wrote:
>" David E. Chavez" <Invalid AddressPleaseReplyToGroup@StupidSpamTricks.COM>
>wrote in message news:brv8hj$gfb$1@news1.ucsd.edu...
>> % cdrw -i image_file.iso
>> Looking for CD devices...
>> Initializing device...failed.
>> Cannot initialize device for write
>>
>> This condition is consistently cleared following a reboot.
>>
>> 1. Any idea what is causing this?
>> 2. Any ideas on how to prevent it?
>> 3. Any ideas on how to reset the CD without having to reboot?
>I use an IDE CD writere on an Ultra 10 and have seen exactly the same
>behvaiour - the drive "fails" and from then on, the only "fix" is a reboot.
>I have no fix, but have found a way to avoid the problem - every time I burn
>a CD and it is ejected (by cdrw), I put a fresh, unwritten CD in there and
>then close the tray. This is of course no fix, but I got tired of rebooting
>all the time. It is also convenient to know that the machine always is ready
>for a new cdrw session, since the U10 is located away from my office.

Why don't you use cdrecord?

It knows more about drive internals and if cdrecord really fails, it prints
an error message that helps to find the reason for the problem.

-- 
EMail:joerg@schily.isdn.cs.tu-berlin.de (home) J�rg Schilling D-13353 Berlin
      js@cs.tu-berlin.de		(uni)  If you don't have iso-8859-1
      schilling@fokus.fraunhofer.de	(work) chars I am J"org Schilling
URL:  http://www.fokus.fraunhofer.de/usr/schilling ftp://ftp.berlios.de/pub/schily

"Joerg Schilling" <js@cs.tu-berlin.de> wrote in message
news:bs1f90$r4g$1@news.cs.tu-berlin.de...
> Why don't you use cdrecord?
>
> It knows more about drive internals and if cdrecord really fails, it
prints
> an error message that helps to find the reason for the problem.
I tried to installed cdrecord once, but found to my disappointment that it
worked with SCSI-drives only, not the IDE CD-writer I use on my Ultra10.
Maybe this has changed - does cdrecord support IDE drives now?

- EL

In article <QPgFb.7568$Y06.118934@news4.e.nsc.no>,
Erlend Leganger <elega@remove.this.online.no> wrote:
>"Joerg Schilling" <js@cs.tu-berlin.de> wrote in message
>news:bs1f90$r4g$1@news.cs.tu-berlin.de...
>> Why don't you use cdrecord?
>>
>> It knows more about drive internals and if cdrecord really fails, it
>prints
>> an error message that helps to find the reason for the problem.
>I tried to installed cdrecord once, but found to my disappointment that it
>worked with SCSI-drives only, not the IDE CD-writer I use on my Ultra10.
>Maybe this has changed - does cdrecord support IDE drives now?

You are wrong.

-	There definitely are no IDE writers.

-	Cdrecord supports ATAPI writers as long as they exist.

-	ATAPI is SCSI over ATA

Where did you  get your wrong ideas from?
Is this from your own thoughts or can you name a source that should be
educated in order to prevent other people from believing the same incorrect
things?

I just added this to the man page:

     Cdrecord is completely based on SCSI commands but this is no
     problem  as  all  CD/DVD writers ever made use SCSI commands
     for the communication.  Even  ATAPI  drives  are  just  SCSI
     drives  that  use  the  ATA packet interface as SCSI command
     transport layer.  You may need to specify an alternate tran-
     sport  layer on the command  line if your OS does not imple-
     ment a fully integrated kernel driver subsystem that  allows
     to  access any drive using SCSI commands via a single unique
     user interface.

in hope that people who get bad advise from other people learn the truth...



-- 
EMail:joerg@schily.isdn.cs.tu-berlin.de (home) J�rg Schilling D-13353 Berlin
      js@cs.tu-berlin.de		(uni)  If you don't have iso-8859-1
      schilling@fokus.fraunhofer.de	(work) chars I am J"org Schilling
URL:  http://www.fokus.fraunhofer.de/usr/schilling ftp://ftp.berlios.de/pub/schily

"Joerg Schilling" <js@cs.tu-berlin.de> wrote in message
news:bs473u$qsp$1@news.cs.tu-berlin.de...
> You are wrong.
>
> - There definitely are no IDE writers.
>
> - Cdrecord supports ATAPI writers as long as they exist.
>
> - ATAPI is SCSI over ATA
>
> Where did you  get your wrong ideas from?
> Is this from your own thoughts or can you name a source that should be
> educated in order to prevent other people from believing the same
incorrect
> things?
>
> I just added this to the man page:
>
>      Cdrecord is completely based on SCSI commands but this is no
>      problem  as  all  CD/DVD writers ever made use SCSI commands
>      for the communication.  Even  ATAPI  drives  are  just  SCSI
>      drives  that  use  the  ATA packet interface as SCSI command
>      transport layer.  You may need to specify an alternate tran-
>      sport  layer on the command  line if your OS does not imple-
>      ment a fully integrated kernel driver subsystem that  allows
>      to  access any drive using SCSI commands via a single unique
>      user interface.
>
> in hope that people who get bad advise from other people learn the
truth...

Thanks for the tip and the education, I will try cdrecord when I get back to
work in January. I definitely did not know that all CD/DVD writers used SCSI
commands... And, the comment was all mine, I have no other source to blame
for the mis-information.

- EL