DVD Burn Failure

I am at a wits end due to full HDDs for over 6 weeks....any help apprecaited.......I have since replaced DVD burner with an new model, again Philips, and although a year newer it is very little different!!
Although I have burnt 1 DVD with Roxio and updated firmware, it takes the PC about 5 minutes to read any CD or DVD........is this problem PC or drive related so I can return to vendor?

 

Free up some HDD space and see if it helps with the CD-ROM problem.

 

I have 934MB free on main C: HDD, and have burnt CDs and DVDs previously with less. Guidance to the amount of room required to be free would be helpful, know where I can get it?

 

I would recommend using CCleaner to housekeep. It will clean temp files (hopefully freeing alot or room), and you can also use it to manage startup applications and clean the registry (although not related to this problem)

Other things you can do to free room are uninstall unnecessary programs, reduce the amount of space consumed by system restore, and the pagefile. Just post back if you need instructions on either procedure.

 

Thanks for that, now have 2.28GB free, but am still experiencing problem with DVD drive not recognizing CD or DVD quickly!!
Philips, the manufacturer have replied and advise that Op system is at fault, but this is up-to-date XP and virus free using Trend Micro PC-cillin.

Are there any other diagnostic tools for further research?