Pioneer bluray drive not working with Mojave

There's a bug in Mojave that does not let empty discs be displayed on the Desktop when inserted into an optical drive. It's not just -RW discs but all types. Once burned with content they will show up.

There are some workaround depending on what you're trying to do.

Be sure to report your situation to Apple via https://www.apple.com/feedback/macos.html.

As Apple leadership and product teams do not participate here, you are imploring your fellow users to fix the bug, and that is a waste of words, to Apple, and to us.

A formal bug report, with sufficient technical detail, sent to Apple will make the appropriate product team aware of the issue if it is not already a duplicate post. If they realize there is something they can do to fix the problem, then it is a resource/scheduling issue for a future operating system release, whose changes are not frozen. Thus, it could be months away from any solution, if at all.

Does Pioneer offer any firmware update for this player that you have not applied yet?

I would not expect Apple to respond as it involves a third-party hardware product, and Apple does not offer any Bluray support in the operating system.

After several hours, I finally solved my problem with playing a commercially produced Blu-ray disk on my 2017 MacBook with Mojave. The 2017 MacBook has only one USB-C port for external connections, so I used Apple's Multiport Adapter to connect both the MacBook's power supply and the Pioneer BDR-XD05S to the laptop. Ultimately, that setup caused big problems. But I'll get to that later.

First, I searched for and installed the latest versions of the driver and utilities for the Pioneer BDR-XD05S. Then I tried playing a Blu-ray disk. Initially, the player made startup sounds, but soon they were replaced what I can only describe as "I'm stuck! This isn't working!"-type noises. Equally ominous was the lack of a disk or a drive icon on my desktop. System Report showed the Pioneer player's connection to the USB 3 port through the Multiport Adapter, but gave no further info. Disk Utility failed to display the Blu-ray disk. I tried disconnecting and reconnecting the player, as well as restarting the laptop countless times. I also tried using a different disk. Nothing worked. I searched Apple Support and Communities. I did numerous Google searches. Nothing I read helped.

Someone here had solved another user's problem by suggesting they try a different USB cable. So I swapped out the USB cable that came with the Pioneer player, replacing it with one I've used successfully on a backup drive. Still couldn't play the disk. That was early in my experiments. It was several hours later when it occurred to me to try replacing the Multiport Adapter with Apple's single port USB to USB-C adapter. And THAT finally solved everything for me!

I hope this is helpful to someone else.

Wait. Old Toad, you said "There are some workaround depending on what you're trying to do."

But you never described those workarounds. I'm in the exact same position as smroush. I have triple-layer BD-R discs to burn on my Pioneer XD05W, but the discs never show up on the desktop or in the Finder window sidebar.

How can I burn the disc if it doesn't show up anywhere where I can add media to it?

Please share your workarounds! Thanks!

Come on now, it's been over two months with this reported issue, and two updates of Mojave, and this still doesn't work?!

I didn't realize it was so dangerous to upgrade your OS, where all sorts of devices and software stops working. All sorts of applications start saying they are no longer compatible, and expensive devices as well.

PLEASE FIX THIS RIDICULOUS BUG!

Okay, for the benefit of everyone who encounters this message thread, I have a workaround. (I found it on other similar message threads here on discussions.apple.com.)

When you connect your external drive and insert your blank disc media (whatever it is: CD-R, DVD-R, BD-R, etc.), you will see the standard popup window asking which app you want to open with the media. Choose "Open the Finder."

Then, while you're on the Finder, go up to the File menu. Choose "New Burn Folder." A folder with the radiation symbol will appear on your desktop. Drag your files to be burned into that folder. There is a Burn button in the window for that folder. Click on the little Burn button in the upper righthand corner of that window.

Burn your discs this way until Apple fixes this annoying bug.

PS: I filed a bug report as many of you have suggested. It takes a village.

I suspect that Apple engineers place their careers in jeopardy for using the term “always" in product meetings.