Can't mount/read CDs anymore?

[choreo]

I have a new 2019 Mac Pro running 10.15.7. I just purchased a new OWC Mercury Pro External USB 3.0 Blu-Ray Reader/Writer (https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/prod...ng_owcmr3ubdrw16_mercury_pro_16x_blu_ray.html)

When I received the OWC unit I first tried inserting a number of commercial stock photo CDs and none would mount. The tray would close and the blue power light would blink a couple times, then nothing and pressing the eject button would do nothing. If I powered the unit off and back on, I could then eject the CD with the eject button. I tried a different USB cable and even tried it on my 2015 MacBook Pro running Big Sur and same behavior.

I finally decided I must have a bad unit and returned it to B&H for an exchange. New unit came in today and same behavior! This time I also tried burning a new blank Data CD and it worked perfectly. That finished CD mounts and plays fine?

So I did some more research and if I am correct, starting with Catalina, it no longer will mount older pre-recorded HFS CDs (I have hundreds) - is that right??? That is my only "guess" as to why this new OWC unit will not recognize any of my CD library from the past?

Thoughts? Is there a solution (other than hooking up my old 2012 Mac Pro with its internal CD which I plan to sell)?

 

[Meatsuit]

Yes, you are correct. You will not be able to mount any HFS CD or DVD data disks. It's not just OWC. When Catalina was released there were a lot of people complaining on the Apple support site about their Superdives could not mounting CD or DVD data disks. So I reloaded the important CD's and DVD's data disk onto an iMac I have in my shop running High Sierra. I got an OWC LG M-disk burner and plan on putting them back on M-disk. Have the older 2012 iMac on my local network. Waiting for Roxio Toast 19 to get updated and fix their issues with Catalina. Then i should be able to drag the files to my 2018 mini running Catalina and burn them back 50GB M-disks. Thats the plan at least, not in a hurry. It's going to take a **** load of time (100 disk plus).

 

[flowrider]

Hmm. I have a CD/DVD reader. Never had an issue mounting older discs. Right now I'm on Big Sur 11.2. I use Toast to burn my disks. I just tried some of my old data CDs, burned as long ago as 2006. Also some old software CDs. No problem mounting any of them. My burner is this one:

ASUS Powerful Blu-ray Drive with 16x Writing Speed and USB 3.0 for Both Mac/PC Optical Drive BW-16D1X-U

ASUS BW-16D1X-U combines 16x BD-R writing speed and USB 3. 0 to deliver the fastest burning speed, and with BDXL support allows the maximum data storage of 128 GB in one disc. The turbo drive is Windows and Mac OS compatible, and comes with a cloud backup solution for Android devices. Support for...

www.amazon.com

BTW, why use the physical device button to open/close the drawer when the OS allows this in the menu bar.

Lou

 

[mdgm]

You could try creating a VM of an older version of Mac OS and passing the optical drive through to the VM and see if that works.