CD drive failing

Hi, i have a relatively old PC, and have recently had alot of problems with Ad-ware, anway, i used this forum to fix that, and am very grateful, but i have a new proble. Well, it actually ISNT that new, its been a problem for quite a while, in that my cd drive appears not to recognise certain discs, games or audio. Now it is a strange selection process, for instance a game with a double cd, it recognises one but not the other! the drive itself is an NEC 282, pretty old, and ive tried updating the driver, but upon downloading it i seem unable to find it in the 'update driver' options, even though i know its there. Any help would be MASSIVELY appreciated, thanks.

 

is the players firmware up to date?

 

could it be that the laser isn't working so well any more? cd drives have a lifespan, and as the laser wears out, it will start to fail reading discs.
Or maybe simply the discs are scratched?