CD and DVD drives appear in My Computer, but unable to read discs

[Annony]

Sometime within about the last week or so I lost both my CD-RW and my
DVD-RW drives. They both appear to be absolutely fine, but neither
one can read discs.

I've tried checking the DMA/PIO mode. I've tried deleting the upper/
lower filter registry entries, after which none of my applications
could find the drives. A "repair install" of iTunes returned it to
being able to find the drive, but it still can't see when a disc is
loaded. I've tried uninstalling all of the Windows updates that were
automatically added since November.

No joy.

The drives appear fine, they appear in My Computer, but if I load a
disc (any disc, I've tried lots) and double click I'm told "Please
insert a disc into drive E:" (DVD-RW drive) or "G:" (the CD-RW). The
Nero diagnostic tool sees both drives and has not complaints. I've
found no errors lurking in logs, no "exclamation points" in the device
manager. Nothing.

Everything appears to be just fine, except that discs are invisible,
in both drives, and it happened in the past week.

Does anyone have any (constructive) suggestions? I've spent (wasted)
way too much time on this over the last week, and I'm seriously
thinking that it's time to ditch Windows, got to Smalldog (a local
Apple) dealer and "get the hell out of Redmond" - because I'm tired of
doing pro-bono sys admin work at home.

 

[Andrew E.]

Uninstalling windows updates wasnt a very good idea....Either way,go to run,
type:regedit In regedit,expand:HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/software/microsoft/
windows/setup/open source path.Locate youre dvd & cd drives,L.click on a
text by one,go to edit,modify,set the letter to as it appears in my
computer,change
all for that hardware (should be two entries for each),once thru,exit
regedit.

 

[MAP]

Sometime within about the last week or so I lost both my CD-RW and my
DVD-RW drives. They both appear to be absolutely fine, but neither
one can read discs.

I've tried checking the DMA/PIO mode. I've tried deleting the upper/
lower filter registry entries, after which none of my applications
could find the drives. A "repair install" of iTunes returned it to
being able to find the drive, but it still can't see when a disc is
loaded. I've tried uninstalling all of the Windows updates that were
automatically added since November.

No joy.

The drives appear fine, they appear in My Computer, but if I load a
disc (any disc, I've tried lots) and double click I'm told "Please
insert a disc into drive E:" (DVD-RW drive) or "G:" (the CD-RW). The
Nero diagnostic tool sees both drives and has not complaints. I've
found no errors lurking in logs, no "exclamation points" in the device
manager. Nothing.

Everything appears to be just fine, except that discs are invisible,
in both drives, and it happened in the past week.

Does anyone have any (constructive) suggestions? I've spent (wasted)
way too much time on this over the last week, and I'm seriously
thinking that it's time to ditch Windows, got to Smalldog (a local
Apple) dealer and "get the hell out of Redmond" - because I'm tired of
doing pro-bono sys admin work at home.

Try uninstalling the drives via device manager and rebooting,the new
hardware wizard will detect the drives and reinstall them at bootup, if
still no joy try this.
http://dougknox.com/xp/scripts_desc/xp_cd_dvd_fix.htm
Yes it is the upper and lower reg edit that you have already tried but it
only takes a minute to try it again and it just might work this time.

If still no joy I would look hard at itunes since you had some improvement
with the repair of this program.
Good luck.

 

[Annony]

Uninstalling windows updates wasnt a very good idea....Either way,go to run,
type:regedit In regedit,expand:HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/software/microsoft/
windows/setup/open source path.Locate youre dvd & cd drives,L.click on a
text by one,go to edit,modify,set the letter to as it appears in my
computer,change
all for that hardware (should be two entries for each),once thru,exit
regedit.

I'm not following you.

In the registry, there is a "SourcePath" under
My Computer/HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows
\CurrentVersion\Setup

However, the value for this key is c:\windows, there's no reference to
the dvd and cd drives. From what I've ready, this key controls where
Windows looks for installation files. Can you explain why this would
have any impact on being able to read CDs?

 

[Annony]

Try uninstalling the drives via device manager and rebooting,the new
hardware wizard will detect the drives and reinstall them at bootup, if
still no joy try this.http://dougknox.com/xp/scripts_desc/xp_cd_dvd_fix.htm
Yes it is the upper and lower reg edit that you have already tried but it
only takes a minute to try it again and it just might work this time.

If still no joy I would look hard at itunes since you had some improvement
with the repair of this program.
Good luck.

Thanks for the advice, but it didn't work. I uninstalled both drives
and removed the keys - that didn't make any difference. Then I did
them as two separate steps (uninstall, reboot, remove keys, reboot).
Still no luck.

Before trying these I rolled the system back to the oldest checkpoint
- 12/6. I have music ripped into iTunes after that date (christmas
CDs), although I think the system was getting flaky around then (i.e.
CDs would occasionally be seen, I might have to put them in two or
three times to get them read ... I thought I had one bad CD - but it
spread to both drives and any CD, DVD or CD-ROM I try).

I don't suspect iTunes, because even My Computer can't see that there
are discs in the drives after the uninstall/reinstall and filter
removal. The drives look fine, but they're always seen as empty.

I did a virus scan, I ran ad-aware and spybot. I have not yet
sacrificed a goat (it's so messy to do indoors), but I'm thinking
about it.

One last thing I'm going to try. I'm going to open up the box and
pull both drives out and physically reseat them. I can't imagine how
they could work absolutely perfectly (no error messages anywhere) but
have a loose cable or be full of dust or something, but it's worth a
try.

I'm also thinking that my holiday vacation will be spent doing a
reinstall - and that frustrates me.

 

[MAP]

I did a virus scan, I ran ad-aware and spybot. I have not yet
sacrificed a goat (it's so messy to do indoors), but I'm thinking
about it.

Its good to see that you still have a sinse of humor about it.
I'm sorry but I'm out of suggestions for you, one drive I would say that it
was bad but with both drives acting this way I'm baffeled.
Good luck

 

[sb]

hi can you tell me if you got your problem sorted as i now have the same only
it is just my cd drive.

 

[Auld Nick]

Helli I appear to have nealy the same problem.


I can't see driver disks for instance : just an example : I have changed my
graphics card for an ATI Radeon 3850 and couldn't see my driver CD in my Sony
DRU DVD reader, event if the DRU drivers are fine and everything is OK in my
configuration pannel system / hardware brower.

NEVERTHELESS i can see and music CD or the original Vista CD, and sometimes
just after accessing my original Vista Ultimate installation CD, if I swap
quickly CD's i can read a data CD... Doesn't work all the times but has seen
to happen.

I'm also desparate about it, first incriminating HDCP handling under Vista
wil my old graphics card which could even handle Aero, an my old Vewsonic DVI
screen but I've now a supposedly full HDCP chain with a Daewo Sensy 22VAL
HDCP compliant screen..

I was thinking of sacrificing Wife instead of a goat, because she gets angry
at all the time (and money) spent on this wonderfull Vista machine

Any idea of how to get MS help ?