Iv recently acquired a EMPREX single layer 8X DVD burner. Not the greatest of makes i know. The problem is whenever i try and burn certain files it comes up with an error message as if it cant find the file its trying to burn. The files in questions are thousands of photo's, i have looked through them and found that for a few files, although windows sees the file, it wont open it, as if it is corrupt, and i wonder if this is the problem, is there any way to get rid of these corrupt files?

Cheers
John

Dani AI

Generated

A short expert note tying together the replies from and and offering practical, long‑term fixes.

Files that appear in Explorer but will not open are commonly one of: real files with damaged data, zero‑byte placeholders, or shortcut/pointer files. Any item that cannot be read by Windows will cause a burn to fail because the writer must read each file during the session. The quickest way to tell the difference is to inspect file properties and try to copy the item to another folder—an unreadable file will usually fail on copy.

Diagnosis checklist:

  • Enable file extensions and sort by size; true image files normally show the correct image extension and non‑trivial sizes, while shortcuts are tiny and carry a .lnk extension.
  • Right‑click → Properties to see size and target; attempt a copy to another drive.
  • Open problematic files with a forgiving viewer (for example, IrfanView) to see if headers are lightly corrupted.
  • If copy/open fails, run a filesystem scan to locate bad clusters; Microsoft documents the Windows chkdsk utility for this purpose (CHKDSK documentation).

Repair/removal notes and cautions:

  • Shortcuts and zero‑byte placeholders can be safely deleted. If files have nonzero size but fail to open, try repair tools or recover from backups. If the volume reports errors, image the disk before further writes and then run recovery/repair tools. Running disk repair can move or mark sectors, so back up any readable data first.

Burning best practices when files are marginal:

  • Verify all files open and copy successfully before adding them to a compile, burn in small batches, use good media, burn at a conservative speed, and update drive firmware/drivers if available. These steps minimize aborts caused by unreadable sources.

Recommended Answers

All 3 Replies

Iv recently acquired a EMPREX single layer 8X DVD burner. Not the greatest of makes i know. The problem is whenever i try and burn certain files it comes up with an error message as if it cant find the file its trying to burn. The files in questions are thousands of photo's, i have looked through them and found that for a few files, although windows sees the file, it wont open it, as if it is corrupt, and i wonder if this is the problem, is there any way to get rid of these corrupt files?

Cheers
John

I doubt if the burner cares if the any of the picture files are corrupt,what burning software and what type/format of blank dvd are you trying to use .
Also if the picture files on you harddrive are corrupt just right click on the file in question and delete it .

I doubt if the burner cares if the any of the picture files are corrupt,what burning software and what type/format of blank dvd are you trying to use .
Also if the picture files on you harddrive are corrupt just right click on the file in question and delete it .

Iv used several differnt types of software CDBurner XP pro and burnatonce, both small freeware programs, the DVD's are 8x Budget DVD -R. I have managed to burn other files onto DVD, just not theses specific ones. Some of the files will show an icon but when you try and open them they say they dont exsist, i wonder whether this may be the problem?

Some of the files will show an icon but when you try and open them they say they dont exsist

Sounds like you are try to axcess old shortcuts!

Be a part of the DaniWeb community

We're a friendly, industry-focused community of developers, IT pros, digital marketers, and technology enthusiasts meeting, networking, learning, and sharing knowledge.