"cdrecord" fails consistently with scsi errors

[Robert P. J. Day]

  for the first time in a while, i wanted to burn a few CDs (FC2-test1,
no big surprise there).  i'm running FC1, and booting *without* the SCSI
emulation feature on my inspiron 8100 with built-in ATAPI CD-RW.

  just to make sure the CD writer is properly recognized, i do:
------------------------
# cdrecord -scanbus dev=ATAPI:
Cdrecord-Clone 2.01a19 (i686-redhat-linux-gnu) Copyright (C) 1995-2003 Jrg 
Schilling
scsidev: 'ATAPI:'
devname: 'ATAPI'
scsibus: -1 target: -1 lun: -1
Warning: Using ATA Packet interface.
Warning: The related libscg interface code is in pre alpha.
Warning: There may be fatal problems.
Using libscg version 'schily-0.7'
scsibus0:
        0,0,0     0) *
        0,1,0     1) 'TOSHIBA ' 'CDRW/DVD SDR2102' '1D10' Removable CD-ROM
        0,2,0     2) *
        0,3,0     3) *
        0,4,0     4) *
        0,5,0     5) *
        0,6,0     6) *
        0,7,0     7) *
------------------------

looks good.  then, to burn, i run:

# cdrecord -v dev=ATAPI:/dev/hdb disc1.iso

what i get (consistently, that is, five coasters in a row now) is:
-------------------------------------
Cdrecord-Clone 2.01a19 (i686-redhat-linux-gnu) Copyright (C) 1995-2003 Jrg 
Schilling
TOC Type: 1 = CD-ROM
scsidev: 'ATAPI:/dev/hdb'
devname: 'ATAPI:/dev/hdb'
scsibus: -2 target: -2 lun: -2
Warning: Using ATA Packet interface.
Warning: The related libscg interface code is in pre alpha.
Warning: There may be fatal problems.
Using libscg version 'schily-0.7'
SCSI buffer size: 64512
atapi: 1
Device type    : Removable CD-ROM
Version        : 0
Response Format: 2
Capabilities   :
Vendor_info    : 'TOSHIBA '
Identifikation : 'CDRW/DVD SDR2102'
Revision       : '1D10'
Device seems to be: Generic mmc2 DVD-ROM.
Current: 0x0009
Profile: 0x0010
Profile: 0x0008
Profile: 0x0009 (current)
Profile: 0x000A
Using generic SCSI-3/mmc   CD-R/CD-RW driver (mmc_cdr).
Driver flags   : MMC-2 SWABAUDIO BURNFREE
Supported modes: TAO PACKET SAO SAO/R96P SAO/R96R
Drive buf size : 1312768 = 1282 KB
FIFO size      : 4194304 = 4096 KB
Track 01: data   632 MB
Total size:      725 MB (71:55.33) = 323650 sectors
Lout start:      726 MB (71:57/25) = 323650 sectors
Current Secsize: 2048
ATIP info from disk:
  Indicated writing power: 5
  Is not unrestricted
  Is not erasable
  Disk sub type: Medium Type A, high Beta category (A+) (3)
  ATIP start of lead in:  -11634 (97:26/66)
  ATIP start of lead out: 359848 (79:59/73)
Disk type:    Short strategy type (Phthalocyanine or similar)
Manuf. index: 3
Manufacturer: CMC Magnetics Corporation
Blocks total: 359848 Blocks current: 359848 Blocks remaining: 36198
Starting to write CD/DVD at speed 4 in real TAO mode for single session.
Last chance to quit, starting real write    0 seconds. Operation starts.
Waiting for reader process to fill input buffer ... input buffer ready.
BURN-Free is OFF.
Performing OPC...
Starting new track at sector: 0
Track 01:  142 of  632 MB written (fifo 100%) [buf  94%]   4.1x.cdrecord: 
Input/output error. write_g1: scsi sendcmd: no error
CDB:  2A 00 00 01 1C D0 00 00 1F 00
status: 0x2 (CHECK CONDITION)
Sense Bytes: 70 00 03 00 00 00 00 0A 00 00 00 00 0C 00 00 00 00 00
Sense Key: 0x3 Medium Error, Segment 0
Sense Code: 0x0C Qual 0x00 (write error) Fru 0x0
Sense flags: Blk 0 (not valid)
cmd finished after 0.099s timeout 40s

write track data: error after 149323776 bytes
cdrecord: A write error occured.
cdrecord: Please properly read the error message above.
Writing  time:  256.470s
Average write speed  16.8x.
Min drive buffer fill was 89%
Fixating...
Fixating time:    0.000s
cdrecord: fifo had 2416 puts and 2353 gets.
cdrecord: fifo was 0 times empty and 1988 times full, min fill was
-------------------------------

  the failure isn't always at the same place, and i've never had problems
with burning before.  any thoughts?  is it possible the burner is bad?
i can't believe all of these CDs were flawed somehow.

  thoughts?

rday