BDR-UD04 works only partially - drive or disk issue?

[ShyGuy]

Hi all,
I just bought a Verbatim drive which is recognized as a Pioneer BDR-UD04. Further below is the info by MakeMKV.

Trying to decrypt my first UHD, it fails with many errors:
multiple lines of: "Scsi error - ILLEGAL REQUEST[...]"
"Can't read AACS VID from disc - most likely current AACS host certificate is revoked by your drive"
"Saved AACS dump file as [...]"
"LibreDrive compatible drive is required to open this disc - video can't be decrypted."
"Backup failed"

The disk is: Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Season 1 (which was successfully decrypted already, acc. to a forum post).

Internet access was enabled; I also tried starting MakeMKV as an admin but that didn't help either. I also deleted/renamed "_private_data.tar" once.

From my understanding my drive should be supported, shouldn't it?
At least according to the flashing guide (?f=16&t=19634) which was recommended for beginners such as me .

The strange thing is:
Trying "Ant Man and the Wasp" failed once with the same error output as above, but then started successfully in a second attempt, with the log output:

"Using LibreDrive mode (v01.0 id=489CDFD6D392)
[...]"

(I canceled that attempt - because I want to get it to work with the other disk), so I can not be sure that it would have finished successfully, but I assume that this is the case.

So it sometimes uses the LibreDrive mode with success, and sometimes it doesn't - and fails -, for the same disk. And it doesn't work at all for another disk.

So I am a bit puzzled whether it is a drive issue (which doesn't make sense because the 2nd disk sometimes works) or a disk issue (which also doesn't fully make sense because the second disk didn't always work), or what might be the reason, and how I shall proceed.

Additional info: This new drive is an external one, plugged in via USB 3.0. I still have an internal drive (DVDWBD SH-B123L) which I have used successfully for BDs for quite some time. Could MakeMKV be "confused", maybe some MakeMKV settings based on the internal drive make the new external drive not work correctly? I have no idea about the inner workings of the program so I do not know if that makes any sense, but I still wanted to provide that additional information about the 2nd drive .

Thanks in advance for your response

Drive Information
OS device name: F:
Current profile: BD-ROM
Manufacturer: PIONEER
Product: BD-RW BDR-UD04
Revision: 1.14
Serial number: CGDL113174WL
Firmware date: 2020-06-15
Bus encryption flags: 1B
Highest AACS version: 77

LibreDrive Information
Status: Enabled
Drive platform: RS8A10
Firmware name: PIONEER BDR-US04
Firmware type: Original (unpatched)
Firmware version: 1.14
DVD all regions: Yes
BD raw data read: Yes
BD raw metadata read: Yes
Unrestricted read speed: Yes

[dcoke22]

If you'd like to use both of your optical drives at the same time, in MakeMKV's preferences there's an option to 'Ask for single drive mode.' With this turned on, when MakeMKV is started, it'll present a dropdown menu to select which drive you want to use. You can then open a second instance of MakeMKV and choose the other drive. You can use each instance of MakeMKV independently.

Even if you do not do that, and are only using one instance of MakeMKV, it should not get confused between drives.

Is the drive powered by USB? Not all USB ports provide the same amount of power. You could try plugging it into USB ports directly on your motherboard or into a high powered UHB hub. Or, if the drive allows for a USB-C connection, connect it via USB-C which should provide plenty of power.

[Billycar11]

Yeah seen something similar on LG USB powered drives that might be what's happening drive reboots during doing stuff makemkv thinks it already uploaded the libredrive code but it's not there after the reboot so it give that error I would recommend a high powered USB hub
Sadly the one I used to recommend on Amazon is seemingly discontinued it was the sabrent 60 watt one but yeah it's gone only the 90 watt is available now and thets pretty expensive

[ShyGuy]

Thanks for your responses
I will try connecting it via USB-C.
If that doesn't work, I will look for a "powerful" hub.

[ShyGuy]

Hi dcoke,

If you'd like to use both of your optical drives at the same time, in MakeMKV's preferences there's an option to 'Ask for single drive mode.' With this turned on, when MakeMKV is started, it'll present a dropdown menu to select which drive you want to use. You can then open a second instance of MakeMKV and choose the other drive. You can use each instance of MakeMKV independently.

Even if you do not do that, and are only using one instance of MakeMKV, it should not get confused between drives.

Is the drive powered by USB? Not all USB ports provide the same amount of power. You could try plugging it into USB ports directly on your motherboard or into a high powered UHB hub. Or, if the drive allows for a USB-C connection, connect it via USB-C which should provide plenty of power.

that was it! I connected it via USB-C directly to the mainboard (backplate) and now the LibreDrive mode worked immediately. The drive itself has a USB-C connector, the cable that came with the drive has a USB-C connector on one side and USB 3.0 Type A on the other side; and an adapter from USB 3.0 type A to USB-C was also provided. So the drive is now plugged in via USB-C->USB-A->USB-C ...
But it works

Now it throws a "Medium error" for one M2TS file, but let's see what it looks like when the disk is finished. At least I know where to optimize now - a one-part USB cable, high-power hub etc.

Greetings and thanks