It will not let me load 1.04 firmware for my Plexetor W1210A
 

I am pretty sure that I downloaded it from a post on one of the forums here. I ran the program, loaded W1210A104.bin, clicked upgrade then in the area where the percentage thing is it says, "Upgrade failed (sense 70 02 3A 01)

So does this mean I am screwed and I can not make back-ups of my games? Or am I doing something wrong that is fixable.

try this
 

the method your tring should be done through MS-DOS or you could just go to there site and download the win32 verson and do it trough windows.

and no i don't think your cd writer is srewed.