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Windows CD burning has always involved a program of some sorts, so Disk Utility seems the way to go. But the implementation Apple went with (and Microsoft in XP) was to just make it so that you put in a blank CD and drag files to it.

No, that wasn't my problem.

I completely and utterly expected that, when I insert a blank CD, I should be able to drag files to it on a mac. That's they way they're supposed to work. It's the way I wanted it to work.

So why didn't I do that? Why did I go fishing for disk utility? Not because I'm a lowly PC user, no no.

The only reason that I ran Disk Utility was because the DRAGGING FILES TO THE CD THINGY DID NOT WORK ON MY MAC. Every time I would insert a blank CD, the icon for the CD would not appear anywhere. Not on the desktop, not in Finder.

That's the only reason I went looking in the Disk Utility.

Anyhoo, I found out why, but it still doesn't solve my problem completely. Here's the deal:

STEP 1:

Go into system preferences, CDs.

"When a blank CD is inserted...."

Change it from "Run iTunes" to "Run Finder"

Voila, now I get the icon on the desktop that I can drag files to. (Thanks everyone for pointing out that I needed to actually tell it to run finder.)

STEP 2:

Now I can drag files to it.

I press burn.

YAY! It now offers me a burn speed option. I can't go down to 4x, but I can select 8x at least. It works! It burns the disc! No billion-RPM, no chainsaw noises, no locked-up mac.

BUT THEN...

STEP 3:

After it's done burning the disc it goes into a VERIFY mode. UH OH.

Billion RPM, chainsaw noises, locked up mac. Only this time, it's locked up so hard that it won't come out of it. Not even the power button works. I have to literally pull the power supply.

There's something wrong with my mac's drive, or there is some configuration parameter that's telling my mac that I have a billion-RPM drive and the drive just doesn't work at that speed. Any time the mac tries to spin that drive really fast, it locks up.

What can I do to tell the mac to slow the fuck down with that drive?
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Tony Fabris