We just bought a new Presario SR1934NX, which comes with "16X DVD+/-RW Drive With LightScribe." We fired it up, and the thing won't read CRWs. A message says that a NERO driver must be downloaded to read them. What? That seems very odd. Can I not get a driver or other software to read the things? I don't want to see NERO launch every time I want to open an RW. Thanks for any advice.

I assume you are referring to CDRW's. What is on these disks? How were they burned? If you burned them in a specific Nero format then I can see your computer asking for Nero. More info please. Also be advised CDRW's are not reliable when burned in one computer and read in another. You should be using CDR's for this purpose.

""Also be advised CDRW's are not reliable when burned in one computer and read in another."" !!! I've never heard that. Thanks. You copy to them, not burn, right? So, why are they unreliable in that way, do you know? I thought that they were in effect, just giant floppies, so to speak.

There have been a lot of instances where you copy data on a CDRW and try to read it in another computer and it will tell you the disk in blank. I have seen CDRW's that you copy to, erase, copy again, repeat this cycle. After a while you cannot read this disk in any computer. I use these in our classroom and always have to have a stock on hand to replace the ones that die along the line. I have given up on CDRW's on my computer. I use CDR's exclusively as they seem to be bullet proof and are relatively cheap to buy. One has to consider that DVD's are in vogue now and CDR's, CDRW's are slowly being phased out.

CDRW's can be used as a "giant floppy" but what makes it act like a floppy is the software. If you've used InCD (what Nero uses) or EasyCD Creator then you've used what is called "packet writing" software. It makes it easy to drag n' drop files like any regular drive but unfortunately discs that are burned on one computer are not always readable on another. You will need to install whatever software you used to copy the files. Good luck!

CD-R media are so cheap I just use them once and throw them away if no longer needed. The "giant floppy" equivalent nowadays is a large USB flash drive, which are dirt cheap and getting cheaper. 1GB flash drives are just under twenty bucks as of today.

I see reference to a "Giant floppy". Some people are under the impression that you can burn files and erase individual files from a CDRW. While it is true you can burn what files you want to a CDRW, when you want to erase certain files you must erase the whole disk. Look here for MS explanation. I certainly agree with Post #5. With the cost of flash drives and CDR's so cheap, why play around with CDRW's.