Saving music from DATA dvd-r

Do you mean save onto your hard drive? If it was originally burnt correctly to the DVD-R as an MP3 file but minus the file extention then, once you have copied it to your hard drive, have you tried [right-clicking on the file on the hard drive, clicking on Properties and] unticking the Read Only box, then renaming it to add the .mp3 extension? I'm assuming you have Windows set up to show file extensions?

 

Sounds like you are using XP's built in writing software which creates a placeholder 'on' the dvd (which is really a hidden folder on your hard disk) prior to you commiting the write stage. Before you say "write these files to dvd" they do look a bit like readme files I suppose.

I suggest you get yourself a decent CD/DVD writing software package, I use Nero http://www.nero.com/eng/index.html

But there are plenty of others.