CD software gets a fix

Easy CD Creator is Roxio's leading product

Roxio, the maker of the Easy CD Creator software, has posted a patch for the program that has been causing havoc for people using Windows 2000.

Last week, many users reported that the latest version of Easy CD Creator was making their machines crash and impossible to use.

Many people were forced to reinstall Windows in an attempt to get their machines working again.

Now, Roxio claims to have fixed the offending program, posting on its website detailed installation instructions to help users overcome problems.

Burning blame

In the past, Roxio's Easy CD Creator program has proved popular with many users because it is easy to use and lets people create CDs full of music, video and image files.

My computer would not boot. I had no idea what could have caused it and was dumbfounded as to what to do

Typical message from net newsgroup

But its popularity was dented last week when Windows 2000 users started reporting that it was crashing their machines, causing them to display the feared "blue screen of death".

The problem also seemed to endlessly extend start or "boot up" times, and made it impossible to use rescue software built in to Windows that could have helped repair the damage.

Messages posted on net news groups contained tales of woe from many Windows 2000 users.

No conflict

"I just installed Easy CD Creator 5 Platinum and the update. After a reboot, Windows 2000 is stuck in the flashscreen status. No hard drive activity, nothing. Cannot even boot to last good profile or safe mode or debugging," said one user.

Others managed to use the software for a few days before something started to go wrong.

Ironically, the problem was traced to a software module called Take Two that lets people take back-ups of their machine to help make repairs in the event of a catastrophic crash.

The Roxio patch says it should not cause any conflicts with Windows 2000.