Problems when playing and ripping CDs. No problems with DVDs.

dsatta · 2026-08-18 18:16:27

I'm on Arch Linux with the latest kernel and using the KDE desktop environment.

I installed a new internal 5,25'' DVD drive as my old one broke. The drive plays DVDs perfectly and is able to rip them without a problem. When I try playing CDs things start to get buggy: playback presents crackles at specific parts of the songs, this happens with every CD and it doesn't happen when played on a different drive.

Playing through the KDE aided audiocd-kio "addon" for Dolphin is extremely buggy and playback stops at 15 seconds after much spinning. It must be played from the files directly, such as launching mpv with mpv cdda:///dev/sr0 or through the Strawberry Music Player device panel. Ripping takes a very long time, much longer than it should take, and the crackles are still present.

As a last resort I tried using the drive on another computer running Linux Mint (this doesn't matter because I also tried using a Linux Mint live environment to no avail) and it worked perfectly: perfect instant playback and perfect rips.

I tried troubleshooting using various LLMs to no avail. I have no idea what to do.

seth · 2026-08-18 20:24:39

For clarification:
1. "mpv cdda:///dev/sr0" works, the problem is the kio addon?
2. Did you also use dolphin/kio on mint?
3. You *did* run the mint live distro (does that ship KDE?) on the archlinux computer?
4. How are you ripping the cd? kio as well or cdparanoia ? Same approach on both systems?

dsatta · 2026-08-18 22:29:49

Thanks for replying

The problem isn't with kio itself, it's just a part of the bigger problem which is that the computer doesn't read CDs properly, as in playback is crackly in very specific points, and ripping is extremely slow, which shouldn't happen, and that the ripped audio files contain the same crackling. I say the computer because yes I did run the mint live distro on the same archlinux computer, so it isn't a problem with the drive, as it works perfectly fine if installed in another machine. For ripping i tried using cdparanoia, asunder, whipper (which completely failed) and EAC through wine, they all took too long to be usable (i'm talking 30 minutes for one song, which stilll contained crackles).

Like I said before DVDs are perfectly fine, excellent even. The problem lies only in CDs.

seth · 2026-08-18 23:16:38

So "mpv cdda:///dev/sr0" has the same playback issues and mint on the host usually running arch had the same issues?

Is the drive attached via sata or an internal usb port?
Do you get errors in "dmesg -W" when trying to play audio CDs?

dsatta · 2026-08-19 07:47:48

Yep, the same crackling and ripping problems happen also on mint on the same machine.
The drive is attached via SATA, i also tried the same SATA cable on the other PC.
No errors present in "dmesg -W" both when playing with mpv cdda:///dev/sr0 and directly from kio on Dolphin, in this case when right clicking and playing the wav tracks on mpv it hangs and just doesn't play while the drive makes a constant noise.

seth · 2026-08-19 08:13:46

Power supply?
The drive is otherwise arranged in the same (sane) fashion in both devices?
It's not mounted vertically or on its head?

dsatta · 2026-08-19 08:17:52

Power supply should be fine, I'm using a Be Quiet! Pure Power 750 W that has no problems powering the other 3 storage drives connected to the same cable. I can try arranging the cables differently. The drive is mounted in the 5,25 bay included in the Fractal Pop Air.

seth · 2026-08-19 08:47:54

Since it's not the drive and not the OS it has to be the host.
If not power supply (what doesn't make much sense anyway since the dvd would likely draw more) … does that thing have illuminated fans? (Googled pictures of it)
Can you turn the LEDs off and blind the window (hang a towel over it)?

dsatta · 2026-08-19 08:54:55

Yes I can turn the RGB Fan's LEDs off but I don't see how that has anything to do with the drive. I can certainly try.

seth · 2026-08-19 08:57:26

It's an optical medium - are the lights reddish or blueish?

dsatta · 2026-08-19 08:57:56

Nothing changed.

dsatta · 2026-08-19 08:59:10

seth wrote:

It's an optical medium - are the lights reddish or blueish?

The lights are blueish, I tried the usual things with all the LEDs turned off with no changes.

dsatta · 2026-08-19 09:38:45

I tried removing the audiocd-kio package and I noticed that reading the CD and ripping is much faster, no weird clicking noises, I guess because the CD is being queried less. But the problems still remain.

dsatta · 2026-08-19 10:33:20

I even tried changing power supply cables, nothing.

seth · 2026-08-19 13:24:29

seth wrote:

Can you … blind the window (hang a towel over it)?

It's not the disks or drive (works in other host) not the bus (DVDs work) not the OS (mint is also only affected on the same host) and apparently not the power supply (which is unlikely because of the DVD situation)
Optical drives rely on dark environment - if light leaks through the case of the drive that's provided by the PC case.
If your other PC is nicely dark on the inside and the troublesome is a lightshow (and we *know* it's somehow the host) that's something to look at.
(The DVDs might have slightly different reflection characteristics or the laser powers up for the smaller pits and overpowers the bright-ish environment)

dsatta · 2026-08-19 16:09:17

I already tried using the drive on my main machine with and without LED lights, also it's worth mentioning that when i tested the drive on the other machine the case was open exposed to the room's light and still worked.

seth · 2026-08-19 16:31:35

The live version of mint runs the same kernel as the one on your main machine?
Resp. the live version has no problems w/ the drive on that machine either?

Does the case have multiple 5¼" slots and did you try them?
(Though I'm not sure how this even could influence anything - any EM affecting the spinner or loose fit would harm DVD reads just as much)

dsatta · 2026-08-19 16:38:21

The live version should be running a different kernel than my main machine since it's mint and updates are a bit further behind and yes on the other machine it worked in both versions (live and installed since the other machine had it installed already).
The case does have multiple slots but trying the other one would be a problem since it's occupied by an hard drive, though i don't think it would matter because i did an incredibly weird test of powering the dvd drive through my main machine but connecting it via sata to the other machine, the drive was just hanging out my case (in the correct position), and it still worked perfectly. So the problem must be to the motherboard or the cpu, they're the only possibilities... somehow. I'm running a Ryzen 5 9600x and a Gigabyte B850 WIFI6.

In the end I've decided i will resort to using a super old laptop as my CD ripping machine until i can somehow fix the problem. I will try using one of those usb drives in the following days though. Thanks for trying to help anyway, i really appreciate it.

topcat01 · 2026-08-19 17:22:56

seth has already covered everything I can imagine, but could it be the power/data cable?

seth · 2026-08-19 17:35:57

Can you at all mount the drive in the problematic case but completely connet it (power and sata) to the good board?
Does it still work?

(In any event you'll win this years contest of most freakish hardware problem. Handily )

dsatta · 2026-08-20 16:06:36

topcat01 wrote:

seth has already covered everything I can imagine, but could it be the power/data cable?

Changing sata and power cable was one of my possible tests and it didn't change anything

seth wrote:

Can you at all mount the drive in the problematic case but completely connet it (power and sata) to the good board?
Does it still work?

As a last resort test I powered the drive from my power supply but connected it via sata to the motherboard of the other computer and it worked completely fine, so it's not the power. It's definitely the CPU or Motherboard, but it's weird that it's such a specific problem.
When I have some free time I'll upload some audio files so you can listen to the problem itself.

seth · 2026-08-20 17:01:02

What I meant was to test the drive in the physical location of the bad system but entirely connected to the good system.
As a cross-test, did you check the behavior of the drive hanging between the boxes but powered by the good and attached to the mainboard of the bad system?
The bus/board kinda doesn't make sense because the DvDs work and at that point it's just anonymous bytes with the data rate of dvd's probably being higher.

Speaking of anonymous bytes, have you checked the behavior w/ data CDs and DVDs?
(Ie is it CDDAs or CDs)

dsatta · 2026-08-20 17:49:38

I guess i could try connecting it entirely to the good system, but I don't see how that would change things, since the drive also doesn't work on my machine when it's completely out of the enclosure.
I didn't try the opposite test no.

I don't have any data CDs but I do have a Video CD and it plays perfectly.

seth · 2026-08-20 17:55:03

I thought you had only established good behavior outside the case (when attached to the good system)

Is the sata controller in raid or ahci mode?

dsatta · 2026-08-20 18:10:01

When i ran some tests yesterday the drive was out of the enclosure for ease of access to cables.

The sata controller is in AHCI mode, I tried changing to RAID just to test but Arch wouldn't boot.

Arch Linux

#1 2026-08-18 18:16:27

Problems when playing and ripping CDs. No problems with DVDs.

#2 2026-08-18 20:24:39

Re: Problems when playing and ripping CDs. No problems with DVDs.

#3 2026-08-18 22:29:49

Re: Problems when playing and ripping CDs. No problems with DVDs.

#4 2026-08-18 23:16:38

Re: Problems when playing and ripping CDs. No problems with DVDs.

#5 2026-08-19 07:47:48

Re: Problems when playing and ripping CDs. No problems with DVDs.

#6 2026-08-19 08:13:46

Re: Problems when playing and ripping CDs. No problems with DVDs.

#7 2026-08-19 08:17:52

Re: Problems when playing and ripping CDs. No problems with DVDs.

#8 2026-08-19 08:47:54

Re: Problems when playing and ripping CDs. No problems with DVDs.

#9 2026-08-19 08:54:55

Re: Problems when playing and ripping CDs. No problems with DVDs.

#10 2026-08-19 08:57:26

Re: Problems when playing and ripping CDs. No problems with DVDs.

#11 2026-08-19 08:57:56

Re: Problems when playing and ripping CDs. No problems with DVDs.

#12 2026-08-19 08:59:10

Re: Problems when playing and ripping CDs. No problems with DVDs.

#13 2026-08-19 09:38:45

Re: Problems when playing and ripping CDs. No problems with DVDs.

#14 2026-08-19 10:33:20

Re: Problems when playing and ripping CDs. No problems with DVDs.

#15 2026-08-19 13:24:29

Re: Problems when playing and ripping CDs. No problems with DVDs.

#16 2026-08-19 16:09:17

Re: Problems when playing and ripping CDs. No problems with DVDs.

#17 2026-08-19 16:31:35

Re: Problems when playing and ripping CDs. No problems with DVDs.

#18 2026-08-19 16:38:21

Re: Problems when playing and ripping CDs. No problems with DVDs.

#19 2026-08-19 17:22:56

Re: Problems when playing and ripping CDs. No problems with DVDs.

#20 2026-08-19 17:35:57

Re: Problems when playing and ripping CDs. No problems with DVDs.

#21 2026-08-20 16:06:36

Re: Problems when playing and ripping CDs. No problems with DVDs.

#22 2026-08-20 17:01:02

Re: Problems when playing and ripping CDs. No problems with DVDs.

#23 2026-08-20 17:49:38

Re: Problems when playing and ripping CDs. No problems with DVDs.

#24 2026-08-20 17:55:03

Re: Problems when playing and ripping CDs. No problems with DVDs.

#25 2026-08-20 18:10:01

Re: Problems when playing and ripping CDs. No problems with DVDs.

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