External DVD drive recognizes disc but won't function

Hi guys,

I have an LG external slim DVD Burner that I am attempting to use with my Acer Aspire One netbook. The drive has no direct power source, as it draws it's power from the netbook using 2 usb cables.

The drive was working fine when I used it a couple weeks ago. Today, I put in a DVD movie, and it would not play it properly. It kind of acted like it was not getting enough power because the movie was playing, but it was like a weird slowed-down version. Creepy. This happened with VLC media player.

I also tried ripping the disc using both dvd decrypter and dvd shrink. The same thing happened with both. The drive spins up really fast at first and starts going, then it stops. Then it spins fast! Then it stops completely. Etc. After about 8 of these rotations, the drive stops spinning altogether, and I eventually get an error/abort message.

I tried LG technical support, but they were morons. Really, the tech support guy told me that because this was a plug and play device, it must be a problem with the software I am using..and that the drive hardware is fine because of that. I told him by that logic I could smash the drive with a hammer, and he would still say it was a software problem. He then disconnected the live chat. So it goes.

Anyway, what can I do to troubleshoot this. I bought this in the U.S., but I have since moved to Germany. So, if it's a hardware problem, it will likely have to just go in the trash. Hopefully that is not the case. I welcome any suggestions for how to troubleshoot this.

Please also note that I have only ever used the drive with this computer, and that it has worked fine for both playing movies and ripping them up until now. The power cord for the laptop is always plugged in while I am using the drive.

My first post here, and this looks like a great forum. I appreciate any suggestions. Thanks for your time.

- Eric

 

I'm sorry to say that your problem sounds like a hardware problem with the dvd drive itself.

 

Thanks for the detailed advice, David.

I am running XP 32-bit SP3. I tried your suggestions, and then I got the same result from the drive.

Funny thing, though. After I did all that, I tried operating the drive with a movie, and it failed. Tried another movie, and that one failed as well. I just tried a third movie, and it is working fine! The disc is being read perfectly, and it is ripping to an ISO. Note that all 3 of these movies (the 2 that didn't work and the 1 that does work) are from the same region and are retail movie dvds. I can see no reason why one would work and others wouldn't. Also, I tried each one multiple times (aside from the last which worked the first time). So, it shouldn't be that I just got lucky on the 3rd try.

This seems bizarre to me. Any potential explanations for this?

Again, thanks for your help. I love the forum.

 

Hm, I just noticed something else after playing with it further. The drive only seems to fail when using dvd decrypter to rip the movie whenever the dialog box to pick my DVD region does not pop up after I insert the disc. If the box pops up and I choose a region, then the disc rips fine. If the box does not pop up, the rip will fail after about 1 minute.

So, it seems like I am dealing with a software issue here. The thing is that the ones that won't rip with dvd decrypter also won't play or open properly with other software like VLC Media Player or DVD Shrink. What could be causing this?

 

Couple things...
Do you use other DVD software, copy-rite decryption stuff, possible conflict, usually not issue unless running simultaneously or on the fly utilities like DVD43

What type DVD media you using? I thinking decrypter only works with DVD+

 

Hi Asus,

I'm not running any other similar software simultaneously. I am also only attempting to play movies and rip them to my hard drive to .iso, so the only discs I am using are retail dvd movies.

Thanks.