Hm, maybe it's just not gonna work with that CD-R brand, as is common. Try burning some new CD-Rs of a different brand and see which one works.
As for adjusting the pots, if you wanna go that route even though it works for originals, akaviolence made a video for that, it was a recent post, so give it a search.
(From my readings around here, if you install a new laser, you'll always need to adjust the pots...)