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problem with rewritable cd's with Windows xp

4K views 18 replies 8 participants last post by  JohnthePilot 
#1 ·
I HAVE A NEW COMPUTER, HAVE ALWAYS SAVED TO FLOPPIES IN THE PAST. THE MACHINE HAS A REWRITABLE DRIVE AND I AM USING CD-RW DISCS. i HAVE TRIED TO COPY FROM A FLOPPY, FROM THE HARD DRIVE, AND SAVE A NEW ITEM, ALL GOES WELL UNTIL I GET TO "WRITE THESE FILES TO CD" THE MACHINE DOES IT THING BUT THEN WHEN I TRY TO OPEN IT OR CHANGE ANYTHING ON IT I GET A MESSAGE THIS IS A READ ONLY FILE. I TRIED CHECKING PROPERTIES BEFORE I CLICKED WRITE THESE FILES TO CD AND "READ ONLY" WAS NOT CHECKED, IF I CHECK PROPERTIES AFTER "READ ONLY" IS CHECKED. I FOLLOWED DIRECTIONS EXACTLY AS INDICATED FROM THE MICROSOFT WEBSITE AND STILL SAME RESULT. I WANT TO SAVE MY WORK TO CD'S (SPREADSHEETS, ETC.) AND MAKE NEW ENTRIES AS NEEDED, (LIKE I USE TO BE ABLE TO DO WITH A FLOPPY). STOPPED AT STAPLES, THE SALESMAN TOLD ME TO GET A FLASH DRIVE, NO MORE PROBLEM, PERHAPS, BUT THIS MACHINE IS 2 WEEKS OLD AND I'D LIKE TO USE THE EQUIPMENT THAT CAME WITH IT. WHAT AM I DOING WRONG??? ALSO NERO IS INSTALLED ON THE MACHINE IS THIS SOMETHING I NEED TO BE USING, NO INFO CAME WITH IT, ONLY WHAT'S ON THE SITE AND I DON'T KNOW WHAT/HOW TO USE IT. THANKS, BARBARABAK
 
#4 ·
an rw disc allows you to erase said disc and write over it again...it does NOT allow you to modify its contents as if it was a hard drive....IMHO rw discs are a total waste of money and time (time also = money) as you have to erase the disc before you write to it again....of course you can choose to do a multi-session disc with any cd-r(w) and be able to add to its contents until it is full...
 
#5 ·
If what you say is correct, I have been misinformed, when the computer was purchased it was put togather for my specific needs and I made it plain that I needed a drive I could save to, make changes, corrections etc, like the old floppies. I also said I would not be burning music or movies so I didn't need that type. What type of cd do I use to be able to save my work and go back to it making changes, additions, etc or is there some other software I should purchase or a different type of cd drive. The salespeople at Staples assured me the cd-rw was what I needed. I'm confused, guess thats obivious huh kind of makes me feel like why bother with a cd drive that does anything other than download software or play music. thanks
 
#6 ·
Let me see if I understand you correctly. You want to work on spreadsheets, etc. and then save the work to cd. Then, you want to open the saved work and modify it. What software are you using to access the spreadsheets? Excel, lotus, peachtree, quicken? I use my cd-rw to save all my spreadsheets and work from them also. It could be you only need some advise on how to load from disk and save to it.
 
#7 ·
allwire, hope you are correct I am using works 8.5 and don't know if it matters but its not just spreadsheets, I tried making up other things, then saving to cd-rw and reopening them, still got read only message. If I check the properties on my work before I "write these files to disc" the attribute Read Only is not checked off, after I put them on the disc and check again it is checked off, and yes I've tried to remove the check but I get a message says error applying attributes, access denied. This is my personal computer, not an employer or one that can be accessed by anyone say at a coffee shop, the library etc Thanks
 
#9 ·
Thomasjk, the disc' copy fine its just that I cannot open them to add or change any information as I said in my post after I click on "write these files to disc" everything becomes read-only. "Nero" is installed on my machine but I don't know how to use or if I even need to, no instructions came with it. I'll take my floppies any day at this rate. My machine has a floppy drive but I thought it was time to move forward and use the newer equipment, or not
 
#13 ·
If your using the XP capability all you will ever get is read only CD's. Thats the way it works. Learn to use Nero. You may have to download the Help files from the website. Using the INCD software that comes with Nero you can format re-writables for use as a big floppy. You will never accomplish this with the native XP burning capability.
 
#14 ·
Barbarabak: the Nero burning software is very easy to learn. It's very intuitive. If you go to programs and then Nero is there a guide? You do not have to go to the expense of buying more hardware if you already have a cd-rw drive. But, my original question remains.
Works 8.5 is very similar to word perfect or word. When you get ready to open a document, are you able to open the document from disk? This is one of the file commands. You click on file then open and choose from the options in the open box. When you open the file from your cdrom drive you should be able to access your data. Can you do this? You should be able to do this. You will actually be working on your document inside Works 8.5 and not on the cd. Once you have made the changes you can save you work to cd. I've found In-cd to be the easiest since it acts like a large floppy. If you need help I'll walk you through it.
 
#15 ·
to Thomasjk,Allwire,Wozer and anyone I might have forgotten, got the read-only problem solved. Seems even though Nero was installed, part of it (INCD) was not, installing it solved problem and I have copied everything to disc which I can add/alter/ whatever to. Thanks so much for all of your help.BarbaraBak

:wave:
 
#16 ·
Hi,
seems as though u have your problem solved. but if anyone needs to know the INCD thing is a seperate install from the NERO disk. i have used it occasionally and it seems to work just like a floppy, although u need to format the rw disks in order to use them with the INCD. hopes this is helpful.

sidecar
 
#18 · (Edited)
sidecar, can't believe how easy it was, just put the nero disc in the machine, click on external install, a screen comes up with some options one of which was incd 4, clicked on that, kept clicking on next until it said it was done. Then have to restart computer when thats done a little yellow box like thing shows up in the task bar on the right hand side, then put a blank disc in the drive, click the little box and its formatted, it was so fast and easy, of course it helped that the person coaching me puts togather and installs computers for a living. Oh well it works I'm happy And yes from what I can tell it works like a very large floppy.
 
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