Bizzare CD writing problems

I have a system running Windows 2000. I have experienced a number of strange problems with CD ripping and burning software... A couple of examples... I can rip CD's with a program called Easy CD extractor, but if I try to rip using Music Match, I get blank tracks, whether I use analog, or digital extraction... I needed to create a bootable CD rom, and used a program called Burn CD, which generates an ISO file, and then writes it to your CD rom. When it got to the point of writing the disk, the program failed, stating that it couldn't locate the CD rom drive... I have tried different CD burners, and I have also tried the CD drives in other PCs to rule out a hardware problem... I can also make these two scenarios work fine on a PC with Windows XP...

I can work around the problem, but it drives me nuts that I don't know what the problem is! Some programs work and some don't. It's as if access to the CD drive is restricted in some way.

Anyone ever experience a problem like this? Could DRM be a factor? Are there security settings in Windows 2000 to control digital extraction, or control, of a CD rom drive?

Any help would be appreciated!

Thanks--
-- Jon