My (second hand) CD/DVD drive will do eve...

My problem is that my long-term DVD R/RW drive,used hitherto only for playing (ie:viewing) DVDs,refuses to "Burn" CD-R blank, recordable discs,and therefore presumably the DVD equivalent,DVD-R,discs,but I don't know why.It WILL do everythind I tell it to,right up to sending files to the drive,but when I click on "burn,"the disc spins up like crazy,but the software give NO indication
whatsoever that the process is taking place,and when I subsequently recover the disc from the drive in question,it is very warm,but contains NO data at all.