Can't see blank cds or dvds, no burn options

Question

I recently started organizing my photos from the past year and wanted to burn them to a cd or dvd as an archive. I found that whenever I insert a blank cd or dvd I get music or video options but no burn option, and no icons show up on my desktop. The only way that I have been able to burn media is to create a burn folder and then insert a blank disk. These then show up on my hard drive but don't see visible on my b&w g3 or my husbands non mac pc. All of this is off a clean reinstall of system software and upgrades to 10.4.4

Answer 1

Take a look at your CDs & DVDs System Preferences. What options are specified for what happens when you insert blank CDs or DVDs? If you want to burn disks with files & folders on them, set it to "Open Finder". You will then be prompted to give your disk a name when you put it in. If you get the music option, you'd have to next open iTunes and burn a music CD from iTunes. Mac OS X will reserve a disk like this and not show it in the finder because it thinks you want to open iTunes and burn your music from there.
A DVD burned on a Mac will not be usable in a Windows PC. Because they hold more information, they'll be formatted as a Mac OS Extended format disk. Without some third party software, a Mac formatted disk like this is not readable by a Windows PC. However, a standard data CD burned by the Finder should be. It will be a "hybrid" Mac OS Extended/ISO9660 disk that should be readable by both a Mac and a Windows PC. It's possible the type of CD-R disks you're using don't work well with your PC's optical drive, you might try a different brand. Since the Blue & White G3 was constructed before CD-Rs or DVD±R/RWs were invented, it's likely it may not be able to read those kidns of disks as well.
-Doug