On Friday 13 Mar 2015 17:10:36 wabenbau@gmail.com wrote:
> Mick <michaelkintzios@gmail.com> wrote:
> > Hi All,
> > 
> > I was given a CD with some pictures, but I am not able to mount it.
> > This is what dmesg reveals:
> > 
> > [ 7791.880206] sr 1:0:0:0: [sr0]
> > [ 7791.880211] Result: hostbyte=DID_OK driverbyte=DRIVER_SENSE
> > [ 7791.880215] sr 1:0:0:0: [sr0]
> > [ 7791.880217] Sense Key : Hardware Error [current]
> > [ 7791.880224] sr 1:0:0:0: [sr0]
> > [ 7791.880229] Add. Sense: Timeout on logical unit
> > [ 7791.880233] sr 1:0:0:0: [sr0] CDB:
> > [ 7791.880236] Read(10): 28 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 02 00
> > [ 7791.880252] blk_update_request: I/O error, dev sr0, sector 0
> 
> [...]
> 
> > I tried on different PCs and I am getting the same error.  Shall I
> 
> Have you tried it with different CD drives or have you used always the
> same (external) drive? If you are testing several CD drives you maybe
> will find one that is able to read the damaged CD.

Each PC has its own (internal) drive.  No success so far.  :-(


> > forget about it, or is there some means by which I can recover the
> > files on it?
> 
> This depends on how the CD is damaged. If it is damaged by scratches
> then you maybe can polish them away. Many years ago I've seen CD polish
> sets available in some online shop, but I never tried this out.
> 
> If there are no scratches and it is a self burned CD then I fear you
> will have no chance to restore the data.
> 
> I don't know if there is a way to restore the data with some special
> software program. Maybe you should search for that on google.
> 
> Good luck.

David mentioned in his post that there are products to clean and polish the 
plastic surface (thanks David!)  I can't see any significant scratches and I 
tried cleaning it with spirit to remove any grease or dirt from its surface.  
I will try to ask the person who gave it to me to use a different make of CD 
next time, but this could take some time.

-- 
Regards,
Mick