How to read/rip audio tracks from a malformed CD?

Question

On Ubuntu 10.04, Linux 2.6.32-70-generic #137-Ubuntu SMP x86_64 GNU/Linux
I successfully read and write CDs (DVD drive), including playing and ripping audio CDs.

However some audio CDs don't play and can't be ripped it seems (most work perfectly well, so I know my drive and my system are Ok - that is my assumption anyway).
Ubuntu sees a few audio CDs as blanks.

I tried cdparanoia with -t varying from -20000 to 20000 to no effect.
I tried cdrecord -toc, with the same results.
Then I tried cdrecord -atip and it shows info as if the CD was a blank CD-R (I also tried -fix, to no effect).

I'd love to know a way to actually listen to or rip these few CDs on my laptop, any online search I made on this topic turned up no answer that I could use or make to work, so any help would be appreciated.

> cdrecord -atip
Device was not specified. Trying to find an appropriate drive...
Detected CD-R drive: /dev/cdrw
Using /dev/cdrom of unknown capabilities
Device type    : Removable CD-ROM
Version        : 5
Response Format: 2
Capabilities   : 
Vendor_info    : 'TSSTcorp'
Identification : 'CDDVDW TS-L633C '
Revision       : 'TM01'
Device seems to be: Generic mmc2 DVD-R/DVD-RW.
Using generic SCSI-3/mmc   CD-R/CD-RW driver (mmc_cdr).
Driver flags   : MMC-3 SWABAUDIO BURNFREE 
Supported modes: TAO PACKET SAO SAO/R96P SAO/R96R RAW/R16 RAW/R96P RAW/R96R
ATIP info from disk:
  Indicated writing power: 5
  Is not unrestricted
  Is not erasable
  Disk sub type: Medium Type B, low Beta category (B-) (4)
  ATIP start of lead in:  -12520 (97:15/05)
  ATIP start of lead out: 359849 (79:59/74)
Disk type:    Short strategy type (Phthalocyanine or similar)
Manuf. index: 26
Manufacturer: TDK Corporation

-

> cdrecord -toc
Device was not specified. Trying to find an appropriate drive...
Detected CD-R drive: /dev/cdrw
Using /dev/cdrom of unknown capabilities
Device type    : Removable CD-ROM
Version        : 5
Response Format: 2
Capabilities   : 
Vendor_info    : 'TSSTcorp'
Identification : 'CDDVDW TS-L633C '
Revision       : 'TM01'
Device seems to be: Generic mmc2 DVD-R/DVD-RW.
Using generic SCSI-3/mmc   CD-R/CD-RW driver (mmc_cdr).
Driver flags   : MMC-3 SWABAUDIO BURNFREE 
Supported modes: TAO PACKET SAO SAO/R96P SAO/R96R RAW/R16 RAW/R96P RAW/R96R
Errno: 5 (Input/output error), read toc scsi sendcmd: no error
CDB:  43 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 04 00
status: 0x2 (CHECK CONDITION)
Sense Bytes: 70 00 05 00 00 00 00 0A 00 00 00 00 24 00 00 00
Sense Key: 0x5 Illegal Request, Segment 0
Sense Code: 0x24 Qual 0x00 (invalid field in cdb) Fru 0x0
Sense flags: Blk 0 (not valid) 
cmd finished after 0.000s timeout 40s
wodim: Cannot read TOC header
wodim: Cannot read TOC/PMA

-

> cdparanoia -vsQ
cdparanoia III release 10.2 (September 11, 2008)

Using cdda library version: 10.2
Using paranoia library version: 10.2
Checking /dev/cdrom for cdrom...
    Testing /dev/cdrom for SCSI/MMC interface
        SG_IO device: /dev/sr0

CDROM model sensed sensed: TSSTcorp CDDVDW TS-L633C TM01 

Checking for SCSI emulation...
    Drive is ATAPI (using SG_IO host adaptor emulation)

Checking for MMC style command set...
    Drive is MMC style
004: Unable to read table of contents header

Unable to open disc.  Is there an audio CD in the drive?

On inserting the disk, this is what shows in the error log:

> dmesg
[949590.704539] sr 1:0:0:0: [sr0] Result: hostbyte=DID_OK driverbyte=DRIVER_SENSE
[949590.704546] sr 1:0:0:0: [sr0] Sense Key : Illegal Request [current] 
[949590.704553] sr 1:0:0:0: [sr0] Add. Sense: Logical block address out of range
[949590.704560] sr 1:0:0:0: [sr0] CDB: Read(10): 28 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 01 00
[949590.704574] end_request: I/O error, dev sr0, sector 0

dd does not work (I guess this is obvious if the CD is not mounted properly):

> dd if=/dev/cdrom of=disk.img
0+0 records in
0+0 records out
0 bytes (0 B) copied, 0.00206955 s, 0.0 kB/s

I even tried cdfs:

> sudo mount -t cdfs -o ro /dev/cdrom /media/cdrom
mount: wrong fs type, bad option, bad superblock on /dev/sr0,
       missing codepage or helper program, or other error
       (could this be the IDE device where you in fact use
       ide-scsi so that sr0 or sda or so is needed?)
       In some cases useful info is found in syslog - try
       dmesg | tail  or so


> dmesg
[950603.014287] ioctl(CDROMREADTOCHDR) failed
[950603.014290] cdfs_toc_read failed

Answer 1

You have a hardware problem. Your drive's alignment is probably out of bounds and needs to be cleaned or probably replaced...

Sorry to be the harbinger of bad news...

I've had a problem similar to yours: but in my case, all CDs could still be read, while DVDs could not... Cleaning the drive with a cotton swab and vodka solved it for a couple of months, but ultimately I had to replace the drive...

Answer 2

OP, I have a few older commercial music CDs from the 1980s which do not work in certain newer hardware (CD drives). They do not appear scratched or dirty, and work in my 1987 boom box. The only thing I can think of is they may not be supported anymore.

I don't want to make any assumptions. How old are the "bad" CDs? Did you make them yourself? If so, what software did you write them with?