CD/DVD not recognizing any media

Trying to help my mom (from AK to FL) fix a problem with her CD/DVD RW. It
does not recognize any media she tries to play. Message: Please insert a
disk into D drive. Occasionally it will pop up an error message saying This
Program Is Not Responding. When it does that, it freezes and after a
restart, Windows XP runs Ckdisk.

In System Properties, the drive is recognized correctly (Samsung xxxxxxx)
and says "this device is working properly..."
Using Remote Assistance, I uninstalled the drive from Device Manager and
restarted- Windows installed new hardware, but did not correct the problem.
I then uninstalled the device from ATA/ATAPI Secondary Channel. Windows
rebooted and reinstalled, still the same problem.

Checking the DMA mode, it showed PIO only, and would not let me change it
(the default mode was "DMA if available". I re-enabled DMA using regedit:
Delete MasterIDDataChecksum from the appropriate subkey in
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Contro l\Class\{xxxxxxxxxx...}
Restart, and DMA was enabled correctly.

Still, no media recognized.

Anyone have an idea what the problem may be and how to correct it?

Thanks,
Fitz

Fitz wrote:
> Trying to help my mom (from AK to FL) fix a problem with her CD/DVD
> RW. It does not recognize any media she tries to play. Message:
> Please insert a disk into D drive. Occasionally it will pop up an
> error message saying This Program Is Not Responding. When it does
> that, it freezes and after a restart, Windows XP runs Ckdisk.
>
> In System Properties, the drive is recognized correctly (Samsung
> xxxxxxx) and says "this device is working properly..."
> Using Remote Assistance, I uninstalled the drive from Device
> Manager and restarted- Windows installed new hardware, but did not
> correct the problem. I then uninstalled the device from ATA/ATAPI
> Secondary Channel. Windows rebooted and reinstalled, still the same
> problem.
> Checking the DMA mode, it showed PIO only, and would not let me
> change it (the default mode was "DMA if available". I re-enabled
> DMA using regedit: Delete MasterIDDataChecksum from the appropriate
> subkey in
> HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Contro l\Class\{xxxxxxxxxx...}
> Restart, and DMA was enabled correctly.
> Still, no media recognized.
>
> Anyone have an idea what the problem may be and how to correct it?

Just because the chips on the drive are still giving out the right
information about the drive (thus it is found correctly) does not mean the
laser is still working properly. Perhaps it is dead.

If you can boot into a different OS (like gettting a bootdisk from
http://www.bootdisk.com with CDROM drivers) and then put in a CD and see if
it reads there - you have eliminated Windows as your problem.

--
Shenan Stanley
MS-MVP
--
How To Ask Questions The Smart Way
http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html