Underscore,

Credit given where credit is due!

The NEC Drives are pretty decent. I do have a few that I purchased, although earlier models. The ND-3540A is probably the next on my list to obtain, unless they come out with a new one by then. They have given good service along with others. I was also given a few from other users that trashed them using third party firmware. I'm not sure if it was the firmware or user error, but I have some spare parts at least. The drives are so cheap these days, it hardly pays not to install a writer in place of a DVD-ROM. Verbatim media has been pretty good for me, but I have had a few issues burning over 12X on a few drives. 8X is OK as long as you are not having trouble. I usually give the advice to slow down when looking for a possible cause of a concern, or for making the more important stuff. Some combinations of media and drive seem to work well at higher speeds. I do a lot of video, so I can see the difference in various media. I have BOXES of the cheap stuff. You can see the irregularities, especially near the outer edges when you hold them up to a good light source at an angle. Small irregularities can cause the video to stumble and create artifacts during playback. Good discs are not that much more and they are worth the extra money. I just see so many media issues and trouble caused by improper burning methods, that it is now one of the first things I suspect if an optical disc is involved.

I have had absolutely no issues getting this new 4.01 DVD to work in a half dozen machines or so. It appears that OpenOffice works on all. It appears that it is pretty stable so far. All I need to do now is learn a little more about what I can do with it. I can get through the basics OK, but it will be some time before I can get to the point that I will feel real comfortable with Knoppix and know my way around it. Windows is my main OS unfortunately, but Knoppix is getting a lot more of my attention these days. This forum is great since most of my questions have already been addressed somewhere, and I have learned a lot by just browsing the posts.

Pgluth1, please post to let us know if you resolve your issues. I'd be curious to know if it turns out to be a media concern.