My pioneer a05 usaully takes under an hour to burn a movie on a 4.7g dvdr but all of a sudden its taking way too long to burn about 2 hours- anyone out there that can help?

check you ide settings or are you doing anything else at the same time.
running edonkey or anything else memory intensive can murder it

I've re-installed O.S and is still taking 2 hours to burn a movie, is my burner faulty? - havent had it 4 long. It was working ok before but just played up for some reason. It is also reading or ripping movies really slow as well

the verifying stage is actually ok, th writing stage takes 55 mins and no progs are running in the back round so its reading real slow

athlonxp2200+
256ddr2100
40ghd
epox 8kha+
pioneer a05
samsung dvd 48x16x
300w ps
winxp

go to start-> settings -> control panel -> system-> hardware->device manager-> IDE ATA/ATAPI Controllers->Secondary IDE (which I assume your burners on) and the click on Advanced Settings.
You mode should be some form of DMA. If it says PIO, change it. If you are unable to and it remains on PIO after restart, click on driver and the uninstall. After you have uninstalled it restart your computer. XP will find the new hardware (your secondary IDE) and install it. After another restart you shoould be now DMA. This was the problem I had and this sorted it. Drive runs at the proper spped now. If it goes back to PIO, I am stuck then but trying the above will either change it to what it should or keep it the same so there is no risk. Hope it works
Best of luck