Some CD ROMs not recognised

I have an ASUS 4824AH CD on my Presario

It will not recognize some CDs which I seem to remember I created (by copying files) using that very CD drive (and used to play in the past) and another commercial music CD at least. No 'play' or 'autoplay' options appear on the (right click) menu, these CDs show 0 bytes everywhere in options, and when I 'open' these CDs in file Explorer nothing is shown (content is empty).

The same CDs are recognized and play on two other computers.

The CD drive in question shows up in file Explorer and opens when 'eject' is selected, but closes again after about 3s. Is this normal ? Should the CD tray stay open ? It won't open by pressing the small button for that purpose on the front of the unit.

It will play commercial CDs from another set. On these the 'play' and 'autoplay' options show up, and the tracks appear when I 'open' the CD.

I apparently have a situation where the CD drive works and the CDs I want to use are good, but the CD drive doesn't work with the CDs ???

Can anyone help resolve this ?

Dumb_Question
26.December.2013

Compaq Presario S5160UK DT261A under XP/SP3
Processor - Celeron 2.7 GHz
Motherboard - MSI MS-6577 v2.1
RAM - 1GB + 512MB (1GB +1GB max) DDR PC2700
PSU - Octigen 300W model 10270PSOTG ('upgraded' from original Bestec 250W PSU [in 2011?])
Nvidia GeForce 6200 graphics card in AGP slot.

 

If David's fixes do not work, you should also consider buying a good quality CD/DVD drive cleaning disk (this is especially true if anyone smokes near the PC or the drive has not been cleaned in over a year). If you buy a decent one, it can also be used on other optical drives (Xbox, PlayStation, Blu-Ray DVD player, car stereo, etc.).

Cleaning the drive may solve the problem, esp. if some discs read and others don't.

Be careful. While pretty much any cleaning disk can be used on a full-size CD/DVD drive, cheap ones may NOT be compatible with notebook drives, Blu-Ray or gaming systems and may damage these types of drives. If you plan to use it on a notebook, Blu-Ray or gaming system, be sure the cleaning disk states it is certified for the drive(s) you plan on using it on.

Hope this helps.

 

I agree with gman. Unfortunately, case fans draw in cool air (and dust carried along in it) through the cracks and openings in optical drives too, and not just the case air intake vents. This dust (especially if sticky with smoke, or even dander from pets and humans) can collect on the lens. A quick blast with compress air or via a can of compress dusting gas (being careful to avoid squirting liquid gas) may just do the trick. Otherwise, a cleaning kit will be needed.

This assumes the drive is good otherwise.

 

I support gman863 argument, then the CD-ROM into the ash layer, it will cause a lot of problems, such as CD-ROM drive failure, computer running slow, crashes, and so on. My suggestion is to first clear the ash layer, and then try again, if you still have problems, I suggest you go to a computer aftermarket for replacement, or directly re-purchase a new DVD Drives. Good luck to you!

 

You might want to check whether the CDs in question still have the data on them. We're all assuming they do but it never hurts to check. You can do this by downloading a program called ISOBuster. The freeware version doesn't recover data but it does identify all of the data on the disk and it uses algorithms different from Windows to access the disk.

Author's Description of Program:
"IsoBuster is data recovery software that can rescue all sorts of data, files, music, video from bad or otherwise malfunctioning optical media, such as CD, DVD, BD and HD DVD. This software communicates directly with the drive and does not rely on Windows to provide the files and folders. This way IsoBuster can access data that Windows can't."

http://www.majorgeeks.com/files/details/isobuster.html

If it turns out that you have data that cannot be recovered via Windows then this app is great. I own it myself for recovering data from older CDs and DVDs (they have a definite shelf life even if you don't use them). It can recover virtually any data from any media type. Good one to have in your toolkit.

 

Sorry about the delay in reporting back.

David GP's fix didn't work (run the MS Fixit tool)

I reckon the CDs still have data on them because they work perfectly well in other machines.

So, it looks like a CD drive cleaning disk / kit which is probably a good thing to have anyway.

Dumb_Question
4.January.2014

 

To add to this post, could the problem be that the PC in question (see foot of post) is on its side (plane of CD tray is parallel to gravity) ? The said problem CDs, I now find, can be recognized in some cases, although I don't know what I do to get them recognized sometimes.

Dumb_Question
5.January.2014

Compaq Presario S5160UK DT261A under XP/SP3
Processor - Celeron 2.7 GHz
Motherboard - MSI MS-6577 v2.1
RAM - 1GB + 512MB (1GB +1GB max) DDR PC2700
PSU - Octigen 300W model 10270PSOTG ('upgraded' from original Bestec 250W PSU [in 2011?])
Nvidia GeForce 6200 graphics card in AGP slot.

 

All computer type optical drives "should" have no problems if vertically or horizontally mounted. If it did matter they would have to be marketed and sold as separate models. As long as the disk is not oriented "beyond vertical", it "should" not be a problem.

I would concentrate on commercial CDs while troubleshooting. They are "pressed" with professional presses instead of "burned" so track alignment is about as perfect as you can get. Burned disks are burned with inexpensive, pretty low-tech writers that don't meet the same tight specification tolerances. This can be really a problem if a disk is burned with a drive slightly off center one way (but still within "acceptable" deviances) and then you attempt to read it with a different drive slightly off-center the other way. The total (added) tolerance deviations becomes too much for stable reads.

So if your drive cannot read even a [known good] commercial (pressed) CD, then the drive has serious issues.

 

All (one or two of) the commercial CDs I have tried work without issue, and other CDs burned by friends are recognised too.

In fact it is only one batch (so far) of CDs that I actually have not burned anything onto (except the Seatools software), but copied files, that my Presario's CD player has problems with, plus one free one from a newspaper.

The fact that the recognition seems to be intermittent, depending on how the CD is put into the drive (so it seems) does support your latest theory, Digerati.

Dumb_Question
6.January.2014

 

Well, I have personally tossed a whole batch of "off-brand" blanks because I was getting more coasters than good burns. I was trying to save a few $$$ by going budget but I ended up wasting my money on the cheap blanks and spending more for good blanks. It would have been cheaper (and certainly less frustrating) in the long run for me to spend more up front for the good blanks in the first place.