My Mac Mini will read some commercial DVDs but not others.

I have a Mac Mini running Snow Leopard 10.6.8 on a 2.53 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor. I've had it for a couple of years now and just recently decided to run one of the video ports out to a wall mounted LCD TV for viewing both internet tv and DVDs. However, turns out my DVD player (SuperDrive, and rarely ever used ... maybe 10x since I bought the thing) won't read certain DVDs. For instance, it will mount and play Charlie Brown's Christmas, but not Pirates of the Caribbean. It appears to be a 'new dvd' vs 'old dvd' issue. Is that a real issue? Is there software I can install that would cause the drive to mount and play my newer DVDs? I'd appreciate any advice here. Thanks.

I have a new mac mini w/o superdrive but I can play all dvd's on the superdives in my MBP and my iMac. The MBP is new but the iMac is 2007 vintage. You may want to try cleaning the lens in the drive. Radio shack and others sell cleaning disks.

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Mac mini will connect to AirPort Extreme, but not internet

I just picked up an AirPort Extreme and hooked it up. My Mac mini connects to the base station with no problem, but will not connect to the Internet. Wen using the airport utility it is an amber light next to Internet.
I am able to get my iPhone and iPad to connect correctly. They both show that they are connected to the base station and the Internet. No sure what I need to do on my Mac to get it working properly.
I'm running 10.8.2 on my Mac. APX is 5th gen.

have you configured your Airport extreme to provide addresses via DHCP?
If your WiFi settings are:
IPv4 Address: 10.0.1.4
Subnet Mask: 255.255.255.0
Router: 10.0.1.1
DNS Server: 10.0.1.1
and WiFi is working with no problems
then having the same settings, just different IP address' last digit should work for Ethernet...
Have you connected the Ethernet cable to the computer as well as the Airport Extreme ?
Alternatively, you may change DNS server address to 8.8.8.8

Preview will combine some pdf files, but not others, what gives?

After years of PC loyalty, I switched to a MacBook Pro four years ago and found heaven. Most of that time I've blissfully worked my arse off at my office on a powerful, simple, wonder of a machine/OS. However, the latest update to my Preview app seems intent on ruining one of my favorite programs. Often I take a pdf file (a cover sheet) and add technical data pages to the pdf by combining other pdf files (drag and drop). This used to work seamlessly without hitches. After the latest update however, I cannot add certain files without an act of congress! Some files stubbornly refuse to combine, in which case I must duplicate the host file, or the files being added (often several times), saving and removing versions before it magically works! Granted, I'm no wiz and I'm quite sure I'm overlooking a simple step that will clear this confusion. Can anyone help? The lovely cash vampires at Apple refuse without payment. Thanks in advance.

GPFSarah wrote:
I'm in the process of transferring my iTunes from Windows 7 to my Mac to sync with my new iPhone 5s. I used an external harddrive to transfer iTunes, and almost everything worked smoothly.
Copy the entire /Music/iTunes/ folder from old computer to /Music/ on new computer.
However, there is one album that's giving me trouble. About 2/3rds of the songs from the album refuse to be transferred into iTunes, and I have no idea why. All the songs in the album are the same format (.wma) and all of them could be read in iTunes on my Windows 7 system
They could be added to iTunes but iTunes converts them as iTunes cannot play WMA files (as Brett mentioned).
You can first add them to iTunes on your Windows computer, which will convert them to AAC & then copy the converted files to the new computer.

Macbook Pro won't read SOME commercial DVD's

I found some people with similar issues, but no one with my exact problem, so I thought I would post it here.
I have a MacBook Pro that I got in November of 2007. Recently I noticed my drive stopped playing certain discs. I did some test and determined that it will play/write pretty much anything you throw at it except for some commercial DVD's. I actually brought it to the apple store and foolisly grabbed some dvd's at random, assuming that NONE would work. The one's I brought mounted just fine. Since I couldn't replicate the issue, I couldn't get much help. He said to try logging into a different user, I guess to determine if there was an issue with my Library. I tried that, it does the same thing regardless of the user.
Basically, some discs spin, and spin like the computer is struggling to read it, then it spits it out. Young Frankenstein and X-Men: The Last Stand, work fine. Children of Men doesn't (it used to work just fine).
I initially noticed the issue when trying to install the digital copies that came with my Back to the Future Trilogy boxed set. Back to the Future's digital copy disc mounts fine. The discs for Part II and Part III don't.
I doubt the drive is busted since so many discs work fine and it isn't ALL commercial discs that won't mount. Only some. My theory is that it's software related. Maybe something with reading certain encoding.
This is the second time I had this problem. The first time I read that verifying and repairing disc permissions would fix it, and it did....but now that doesn't do the trick.
It is consistent though. The same discs either work or don't work EVERY time. I thought maybe the lens needs cleaning. I read conflicting things about using lens cleaning discs in slot load drives so that's a last resort. But I imagine it wouldn't be so consistent if it was a dirty lens. Also, other players I've had with dirty lenses just skipped or had a disc read error of some sort. I don't get any errors. I also ran the Hardware Test on my OSX Install disc, which found no errors/issues. I wonder if it would have detected my drive as an error if it indeed was a hardware issue? Makes sense to me, but I'm not sure what the Hardware Test tests exactly, if the drive is included in that.
Any suggestions? I saw a thread from 2006 where someone suggested that deleting (Library/Preferences/com.apple.finder.plist) helped him, but I am really hesitant to delete an item from my Library. That just seems like asking for trouble and I'm not sure what my finder preferences have to do with my DVD's not mounting. Next I will probably try resetting my SMC. I'm not sure how that could help either, but it's a suggestions I've seen floating about and it's easy enough to do.
Here are some of my specs:
Macbook Pro, Intel Core2 Duo, 2.4 ghz
4gb Ram
Boot ROM Version:    MBP31.0070.B07
SMC Version (system):    1.16f11
MATSHITA DVD-R   UJ-857E:
Firmware Revision:    ZA0E
Interconnect:    ATAPI
Burn Support:    Yes (Apple Shipping Drive)
Cache:    2048 KB
Reads DVD:    Yes
CD-Write:    -R, -RW
DVD-Write:    -R, -R DL, -RW, +R, +R DL, +RW
Write Strategies:    CD-TAO, CD-SAO, DVD-DAO
Media:    To show the available burn speeds, insert a disc and choose View > Refresh
Thanks. Sorry for the long and overly thurough post, but I thoguht that might help get me better help. Any input is greatly appreciated as it may save me the hour long trip back to the apple store.

I'm also having the same exact issues with some commercial DVDs and music CDs. It continues to read DVD-RWs but around two days ago it stopped reading commercially bought discs.
I've tested with brand new DVDs today (out of shrink wrap in pristine condition) all of which have the same region and have been tested on a DVD player, PS3, and another laptop without any glitches but only some of them played on my Macbook and the others would either spin for a bit and then ejected or it would read them as blank discs where the 'You inserted a blank DVD' message comes up.
I also tried testing older DVDs that used to play fine on my Macbook but only some of them mounted.
I then tried the following cleaning methods:
- Laser Lens Cleaner
- Compressed air
- Credit card with iPhone cleaning cloth
All of which failed to fix the problem so it's safe to assume this isn't a dust issue, the driver have also been very lightly used as I have only watched a handful of DVDs on it and written less than 10 DVD-RWs since I first purchased it in 2009.
My warranty has expired and replacing the drive would cost over $250 which I currently can't afford, therefore I plan to buy a cheaper external DVD burner but that is only a temporary workaround and I still hope for a solution other than replacing the driver.
Here's my info:
MacBook, Intel Core 2 Duo, 2 GHz
2 GB RAM
Boot ROM Version:    MB52.0088.B05
SMC Version (system):    1.38f5
MATSHITA DVD-R   UJ867A:
Firmware Revision:    KK08
Interconnect:    ATAPI
Burn Support:    Yes (Apple Shipping Drive)
Cache:    2048 KB
Reads DVD:    Yes
CD-Write:    -R, -RW
DVD-Write:    -R, -R DL, -RW, +R, +R DL, +RW
Write Strategies:    CD-TAO, CD-SAO, DVD-DAO
Media:    Insert media and refresh to show available burn speeds

Problem viewing streaming video in some wifi networks, but not others

When I am at work (university), I can not view YouTube videos or video streaming from news sites such as cnn mobile on my ipod touch 2g.
<m.cnn.com/videos.jsp?ckey-cnn)06#__1_>
When I called Apple support, they had me reset-restore. I still had the problem. I went to the Apple store Genius bar and the problem no longer existed, the videaos downloaded and played from both sites!
But at my diner and at work, I get the message, "This movie could not be played" in a popup box with an OK button. The same message appears if I use the YouTube application. I click on any video, and the same popup appears. In Cnn the popup is preceded by a shaded capital Q that looks like the blue Quicktime Q; in Youtube the pupup is preceded by a YouTube icon in gray with the "Tube" surrounded by the rounded rectangle, their icoon...
At the Apple store the popup never appeared, and the videos downloaded and played.
I have no trouble playing movies I have downloaded from iTunes.
I did not have this problem when I initially got my iPod Touch, and I think it appeared after one of the last two system upgrades, but I am not sure.
I am curious that it the problem happens at two places, my diner and at work.
The speed of my wireless work network, as judged by the ipod app speed test is 9915 kbps download and 6971 kbps upload, so plenty fast.
The first time I noticed this issue was with the application "At Bat Lite" which also won't play video highlights at work.
I do not have WiFi at home
Any thoughts about what would cause this lack of functionality apparantly only at some networks but not others?
Oh, one more piece of data: at work a Macbook will play YouTube both on ethernet and using wifi...
Thanks for any thoughts or suggestions,
Paul

It seems I have two networks available at work, one is behind our firewall, and I login to it. This is the network that I can't view streaming video. There is also a "Guest" network that I don't need to login to. This one works with the YouTube and the news site videos.
Thus, I conclude there is a setting that WiFi network administrators can invoke that specifically can block streaming video on some protocols (whatever the ipod touch uses) and not others (whatever the Macbook uses). But the same router hardware supplying the Guest network does not block these protocols. Presumably this has to do with security on one side of the firewall(?)
Anyway, apparently outside of the WiFi controls available in the ipod touch settings.
Weird...
Paul

Mac Mini will read from but not write to external CD/DVD drive

My new Mac Mini won't write CDs or DVDs to my LaCie DVDRW external drive, either in iTunes or through the finder. The computer appears to be writing the disc and then there's an error message right at the end of the process that says it can't access the drive (error code 0x80020020). In reading the help materials, I came across something that said iTunes would only write to an internal drive or a Mac superdrive. That's really no help to me since the Mini did not come with an internal drive. Surely Apple can't be saying I have to go out an buy a new drive for this machine. Has anyone else had this problem?

You did not answer the question of whether or not the drive works when connected to another Mac or a PC? This is a critical question.

Mavericks will read my external drive but not write to it

I have a Mac Mini ( late 2012) and have the latest version of Mavericks running. I am using an external drive for backing up my photos. About 4 months ago I received an error message that the backup failed and to check the drive using the disk management utility. I checked it using the repair function and it stated all partitions looked ok, there is only one partition. But in order to get it to work again I erased the drive and formatted again. Once complete I set the drive back up using Time Machine. All was good for a few months and then it started all over again. Now after I erase and reset up it only runs for a few backups and then starts with the error messages again.
I am able to read from my hard drive so believe it's defective but I'm not a technical person so don't know for sure. Has anybody else experienced tis? If so were you able to correct it? and ow did you correct it?
Thx.

Thanks to you and all who responded. The majority of responders indicated that the drive was failing. I ran the disk utility again (umpteenth time ) and it said the same thing, nothing was wrong. But I figured the masses couldn't be wrong so I found another External drive to backup to and so far so good. However this happened before as well when after a few weeks it stopped writing to it. So for now all is well and hopefully it will remain this way.
Thx again to all.

IPad mini will connect to wifi WAN, but not wifi LAN?

Connecting to Sierra Hotspot, mini will only stay connected with Internet access turned on: won't connect to wifi LAN without internet access? iPad and even iPhone and MacBookAir have no problem... The mini redirects me to turn-on the Internet network when trying to connect to the wifi, and this isn't always necessary or available, and it won't allow me to do anything else until the "Internet connection issue is resolved".
I've tried all of the usual things: reseting the iPad mini, various connection techniques, even an AirPort Express bridge...

This was resolved by entering network setting manually.

IPhoto6 likes some photo's but not others

Hi All,
I've a real problem with iPhoto and thought some of you gurus could maybe help. I've around 3500 photo's in my library. I populated my library by importing photo's from my folders on my Windows PC (networked to my Mac) and more recently directly from my camera (all done as I'm supposed to - through iPhoto). The photo's are all there, no problems opening iPhoto etc - the application is swift and neat. Now here's the problem.
I have created a number of albums and have organised my photo's (or am trying to) by album. I'm dragging the photos from the main library into the appropriate album, however, some photo's do not like being dragged and dropped at all - they eventually do (after say 5 minutes of spinning beach ball) place a copy (or reference to main original file) in the album. There may be some reason behind this but from my perspective it appears random - there's no telling which photo iPhoto will and will not like. This reduces my productivity heaps - what should be a very slick and easy task turns into a hair-pulling, eye-poppingly frustrating one.
This of course also mucks up all the other iLife applications eg iDVD - I'm using the albums to create slideshows - dragging and dropping the albums to a slideshow created in iDVD easy? Nope - will not import some photo's. Same goes for iWeb.
There should be no problems with imported photos as I kept all photo's on my old PC organised in a similar way to the Mac does anyway ie by month and then by original and by edited.
I've also tried cleaning thumbnails and entire library (marginal performance achieved) and running onyx to clean permissions etc. I've taken out RAW files and movies taken on camera's to see if that would work...nope. Running out of ideas now...
MacBook Pro Mac OS X (10.4.7)

do you know if it is possible to open multiple instances/windows of iPhoto
As Terence stated, no. The best you can do is to use iPLM or iPhoto Buddy to quickly jump between libraries. Or use iTLM to merge the one library into the other and keep them all in one. In any case take a look at the tip at the end of my signature. It may help protect you against damaged database files which has been an all to common problem here.
Do you Twango?
TIP: For insurance against the iPhoto database corruption that many users have experienced I recommend making a backup copy of the Library6.iPhoto database file and keep it current. If problems crop up where iPhoto suddenly can't see any photos or thinks there are no photos in the library, replacing the working Library6.iPhoto file with the backup will often get the library back. By keeping it current I mean backup after each import and/or any serious editing or work on books, slideshows, calendars, cards, etc. That insures that if a problem pops up and you do need to replace the database file, you'll retain all those efforts. It doesn't take long to make the backup and it's good insurance.

IPhoto downloads some pix & video but not others in the same format

For the past two weeks iPhoto is giving me error messages on some of the photos and videos I try to import from my SD card. I never had this problem before but it will import some of the photos and MPEG-4 videos but at the end, it lists all the ones it can't import.
For the photos it lists them all as below with the message that they are unreadable files. Then it says "The following files could not be imported (they may be an unrecognized file type or the files may not contain valid data.)
/Volumes/NO NAME/DCIM/100SSCAM/STH73614.JPG
/Volumes/NO NAME/DCIM/100SSCAM/STH73615.JPG
/Volumes/NO NAME/DCIM/100SSCAM/STH73616.MP4
/Volumes/NO NAME/DCIM/100SSCAM/STH73617.JPG
As you can see they all have valid file type extensions. It's particular odd because I downloaded a very short video clip I shot with no problem but did not download the one I shot just seconds before because "this is not a movie file."
Curiously I was able to download the pix and videos on my work Windows computer. But I had to email them to myself in order to be able to get them into an iPhoto album.
Once I get these latest ones off the SD card I will reformat it. I assume the problem is with the card, right?

Jane:
Once you get the files off the memory card use the camera to reformat the card before using again. Other users have reported similar issues and a reformat in the camera solved their issue.
TIP: For insurance against the iPhoto database corruption that many users have experienced I recommend making a backup copy of the Library6.iPhoto (iPhoto.Library for iPhoto 5 and earlier versions) database file and keep it current. If problems crop up where iPhoto suddenly can't see any photos or thinks there are no photos in the library, replacing the working Library6.iPhoto file with the backup will often get the library back. By keeping it current I mean backup after each import and/or any serious editing or work on books, slideshows, calendars, cards, etc. That insures that if a problem pops up and you do need to replace the database file, you'll retain all those efforts. It doesn't take long to make the backup and it's good insurance.
I've created an Automator workflow application (requires Tiger or later), iPhoto dB File Backup, that will copy the selected Library6.iPhoto file from your iPhoto Library folder to the Pictures folder, replacing any previous version of it. There are versions that are compatible with iPhoto 5, 6, 7 and 8 libraries and Tiger and Leopard. Just put the application in the Dock and click on it whenever you want to backup the dB file. iPhoto does not have to be closed to run the application, just idle. You can download it at Toad's Cellar. Be sure to read the Read Me pdf file.
NOTE: The new rebuild option in iPhoto 09 (v. 8.0.2), Rebuild the iPhoto Library Database from automatic backup" makes this tip obsolete.

Trouble loading some web pages but not others

having a little trouble lately...
For some reason safari and, well, any other browser, come to think of it isnt work on particular pages.
Example. The other day google.com wasnt coming up just spinning its wheels then saying:
Safari can’t open the page “http://google.com/” because it could not connect to the server “google.com”.
Another example: Safari could not open the page “http://cbgundaker.com/” because the server stopped responding.
I called my ISP and sat thru 2 hours worth of trouble shooting and got nowhere. They thought it was a DNS issue but I can reach the sites from other machines in the network so it looks like it is only effecting this particular powerbook. I've sat two machines down next to each other and it'll work on one but not the other(same wireless or wired network). annoying.
Anyone have any ideas?
Thanks,
p

pardon me for butting in, this problem is driving me crazy.
i just tried your dns thing, no effect.
what i can't understand is why does my iBook display all 5 pages that i can't display on my iMac? i visit these sites everyday
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-i copied the iBook plist for internet and safari over to my iMac-no change
-i did all the resets, clear cache, disk utility,ditch plists
-safari, camino,opera,firefox,shirra do not open these 5 pages
-macworld.com opens fine, macworld.com/news/ does not
-my admin account does not display these 5 pages
-i turned on airport, connected to someone's unprotected network and tried the sites to no avail (i have my own wired internet connection)
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i am at wits end!

Superdrive will read Tiger Install Disc, but not DVD's

I recently had my hard drive crash, so I installed a new one because I didn't have time to wait. The installation went fine, but now when I try to install Leopard, it won't read any DVD's, so I had to install TIger back on my Macbook. Are there any reasons that when I installed a fresh new hard drive that would make my superdrive need some other update or something, because it won't read DVD's?
Thanks

Are there any reasons that when I installed a fresh new hard drive that would make my superdrive need some other update or something, because it won't read DVD's?
Hello smp450!
No, the new HD only needed to be reformatted for your Mac. Your original grey-label Tiger Install Discs are also DVDs, same as Leopard.
You may have missed the answer you received from Smokerz in your previous thread:
http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=6686146#6686146
Now that you've installed the original Tiger OS onto your new HD, are you able to use the Leopard DVD to upgrade? If so, then there is no longer a problem, right? If there is still a problem, where did you purchase the Leopard DVD?

SB-Z. Audio missing in some Chrome tabs but not other. Also some sounds in X-Plane.

I just installed a Z that I got a while back (my son, shall we say, wondered off with it for a bit). However, I'm having issues with it.
The first thing I noticed is that, after setting it up and making sure it's set up correctly in the BIOS (Asus Maximus VI Hero motherboard), I noticed that I had a Youtube video that wouldn't play audio. However, other tabs were able to play audio. Jumped over to Firefox and that same video would play audio. Chrome issue, I thought. Then it happened in Firefox.
I basically forgot about this and then went to play X-Plane. There I use a headset (to interact with other players on a network). I forgot to plug in the headset so I plugged it in after the game loaded. However, I then noticed that SOME game sounds worked (switches in the cockpit, buttons, voice from other players) but others didn't (engine sounds, atmospheric sounds like wind, etc.)
Rebooting fixed it temporarily but now the issue is back.
Is there some setting somewhere that's causing this that maybe I missed? I'm new to the SB control panel. Are others having this issue?

This is because it is a green loop, which when dragged to a Software Instrument track, will load an EXS instrument. To play it as audio, drag it to an Audio track.
To rectify the missing sample from the EXS kit, reindex Spotlight for the disk the sample is supposed to be on (probably your startup disk.
To reindex a disk:
Open Apple menu > System Preferences > Spotlight
Click Privacy tab
Drag disk to list. Wait 4 seconds. Now hit the -(minus) button to remove the disk from the privacy list. Reindexing will start within about 20-30 seconds, and will take 10-30 minutes, depending on what's on the disk.
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Why does my iPad recognise some contact names but not others I can send some messages but not others

When I try to send messages some names are recognised and some are not

If you are talking about iMessage... It will send messages to people that are using ios5, and have turned I message on on their device. For your other contacts, you need to send a good old fashioned e mail.

Image displays in some jsp files but not others

OK, I have a jsf jsp pages js tag for my application that occurs in several jsp pages:
<tr>
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</tr>     footer.jsp has an image tag like this:
<td align="left"><img src="images/logo.jpg" alt="X Systems"/></td>     The jsp files are in a directory which is under the base directory like the include and image files. For some reason, in one jsp page the logo.jpg file does not get displayed. As I understand it, the application server jboss/tomcat resolves the image files. Why would it be displayed it in one page and not another?

You are using a relative link to access your image.
That means it will look for your image relative to the page it last served.
If you ask for http://myapp/root.jsp, it will locate http://myapp/images/logo.jsp
If you ask for http://myapp/module/index.jsp it will locate http://myapp/module/images/logo.jsp
If you right click on your image / broken image placeholder and look at its properties, you should be able to see the url which it is trying to fetch the image from.
The client will resolve relative links from the address url it last accessed. It knows nothing of any serverside forwards/includes that you might have done.
So if you access http://myapp/action and forward to /moduel/accounting/balanceSheet.jsp it will still treat the url as http://myapp/action for resolving relative links.
As far as the client is concerned, the root is /
As far as your web application is concerned, the root is /myapp (or whatever your context name is)
Because of this you can't give your images an static absolute url, because you would be hardcoding the context name into your jsp.
Alternatives
- use something like <img src="<%= request.getContextName() %>/images/logo.jsp"/>
- use a tag library to hide the implementation of option #1 (like struts tag html:img)
- only use relative links, and always specify a html <base> on your page to resolve relative links from.
Hope this helps,
evnafets

My Mac Mini will read some commercial DVDs but not others.

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