isn't DL the 8.5GB DVD9's or can you buy DVD9's without DL

I doubt the drive will burn dual layered at that age although I may be wrong.

yeah probably. thats what i'm figuring

What make and model is the drive Troy and I'll hoof round and find out mate although if it was DL it should say so on the front.

i have a gateway 5200XL. all is the same as when i bought it except for i added 1 Gig of RAM and a 4350 Radeon Video Card.

In Device Manager it says:

_NEC DVD_RW ND-3500AG

This is what it says on the gateway website i have when i put in the serial number:

16X Double-Layer Multi-Format DVD Writer DVD+/-R/+/-RW/CD-R/RW Drive [Part #5503382]

so it says Double Layer Multi-Format so does that mean Dual Layer?

oh yeah and i didnt notice it before but yeah on the front theres an icon in the middle that says RW with a square around it and underneath it it says DVD+R DL.

could there be a driver you have to download to burn DL's?

also i bought memorex DVD+R DL's. could they be faulty discs. one time i bought maxell (never bought them again) because the whole stack didn't work. but i've used memorex CD-R's and they were always good so i dont know.

DVD writers don't have drivers, but they do have firmware updates and it's possible that it could fix your problem. You can download the one for yours here which will take you to an instructions page that you can read and then click the accept button to be given the download.