Help! Can't Burn to Folder or DVD

[George Tyndall]

My 51-minute HD movie, which plays without error from start to finish despite being un-rendered, starts to encode but then, part way through the process, the external HDD to which I am sharing it makes the sound that one hears upon disconnecting it. Then, I immediately see the Autoplay dialog that appears when one is attaching an external HDD.

I tried burning directly to DVD instead of to foider but the same thing happened.

I checked the drive and it has 243GB of availabe space, and it does not need to be defragmented.

So, I took Sidd's suggestion and rendered the Timeline--but the same thing happened again.

The only oddity about this movie is that I created a Still from a clip, and in the folder that I saved all my work for this project I see two .BMP files (Stills). Could this be the reason, and if so, what is the workaround?

Thanks!

[RJ Johnston]

I had an external hard drive that would overheat and when that happened you could hear the drive disconnect. I was transferring a lot of data over USB from my PC to the external hard drive. I hooked a thermometer to the outside case, and when the temperature reached something like 98 degrees on the outside case, it would disconnect.

[George Tyndall]

I had an external hard drive that would overheat.

Okay, thanks, I will try again first thing in the morning, after resting them overnight.

[Steve Grisetti]

And do make sure that external hard drive is formatted NTFS rather than FAT32 (as they are by default from the factory).

FAT32 drives have a file size limitation that will definitely choke any attempt at a DVD burn.

[George Tyndall]

So, I took Sidd's suggestion and rendered the Timeline--but the same thing happened again.

Here's some follow-up: Before going to sleep I Shared the PREL file to PC as an MPEG2--on the same HDD to which I had tried to Burn to Folder--and awoke to see that the save was a success. Interestingly, after closing and then reopening the movie before Sharing to PC, I noted that the red lines had reappeared, in other words, my previously rendered movie was now un-rendered!

As of this moment, I have Burned to Folder and also Burned DVD from Folder this still un-rendered movie, and I've just started to burn the Blu-ray disk.

As to why I could not Share a rendered movie last night but have now successfully saved--and resaved in a different format--an un-rendered movie, I haven't a clue.

[Bobby]

George, it seems obvious that the drive disconnected itself. That would have nothing to do with usage, but if the drive overheated (assuming they have that detection) or some other detectable physical problem, then the drive logic might have disconnected and reconnected. BUT, I have never seen that happen.

I would try replacing the cable if it happens again, and I would also use the shortest cable that you can use.

[George Tyndall]

I would try replacing the cable if it happens again, and I would also use the shortest cable that you can use.

It's an internal drive, Bobby.

And the plot thickens: Although I successfully Burned to Folder then Burned from Folder a SD DVD--and I also was able to Share to PC as an MPEG2/m2t--I am unable to burn a Blu-ray disc from the PREL file AND, in addition, I am also unable to burn a Blu-ray disc by importing that MPEG2/m2t file into PRE7. The latter process gets all the way through Media Encoding and Compiling Media but, as soon as it switches to Burning DVD, I get "fatal error."

[George Tyndall]

[ The latter process gets all the way through Media Encoding and Compiling Media but, as soon as it switches to Burning DVD, I get "fatal error."

Bobby, after the MPEG2 failed to burn I decided to try, one last time, burning the Blu-ray disk directly from the PREL Timeline--and it worked.

My guess is that RJ Johnston had the right reason--overheating of my external HDDs, despite the fact that all 6 of them have internal fans and all are well-ventilated. Do you agree?

[Bobby]

Sorry George, I am mixed up. In your first post you said:

"the external HDD to which I am sharing it makes the sound that one hears upon disconnecting it"

but then you said it is an internal drive.

And then in your last post, you say again:

"My guess is that RJ Johnston had the right reason--overheating of my external HDDs".

So, which is it?

I do not believe that SATA (or eSATA) drives make the disconnect sound. They are not Plug and Play devices, and don't dynamically connect or disconnect. That is why eSATA drives are difficult to use as they must be on at boot since no Plug and Play.

Overheating can certainly happen, but I have only (rarely) seen it in very small, compact cases, or where you have multiple hard drives mounted in adjacent slots. Since you have a lot of hard drives, that could be the problem. But you can get software that monitors hard drive temperature - if a suspect you should be running that software all the time. I am not sure if external drives support temperature detection, but even if they do they are usually one per case and usually have adequate ventilation if large, hot drives.

If in fact it is an internal drive, they still have cables and connectors. I have discussed SATA connector issues with other local PC consultants and we all agree they can be problematic. So it could still be a cable even if internal, or it could even be a motherboard problem.

So could you please again explain exactly what is failing and in what sequence?

[Peru]

Overheating can certainly happen, but I have only (rarely) seen it in very small, compact cases, or where you have multiple hard drives mounted in adjacent slots. Since you have a lot of hard drives, that could be the problem. But you can get software that monitors hard drive temperature - if a suspect you should be running that software all the time. I am not sure if external drives support temperature detection, but even if they do they are usually one per case and usually have adequate ventilation if large, hot drives.

I think my hard drive failure some time ago was was due to three drives stacked together.
I added two fans to cool the drives and one additional fan to exhaust at the top (where expansion bays were) and have been "cool" ever since.

[George Tyndall]

but then you said it is an internal drive.

Yes, I typed internal when I should have typed external, and I have no idea why.

BTW, as you may see from what I just posted in the Water Cooler Forum, one of those two drives (and only one, thankfully), subsequently crashed. So I've now had two HP Personal Media Drives (one 500MB and one 1TB) crash after only a few months of use, while my HP 160GB PMD has given me years of hardworking use. I also had a 1TB LaCie that crashed just after 1 year of use.

Do you know whether smaller drives are inherently less likely to have probems?

[Bobby]

I like Western Digital, but those are not without problems I hear. It is a pity - hard drives used to be ultra reliable, but for the past few years the manufacturers have been pushing the envelope, in a race for higher and higher capacities. That would imply that the older, smaller drives would be more reliable, but not necessarily so it seems.

Redundancy is your only protection.