Read this for CD/DVD Drive with burning, missing drives, not seeing discs

[RBanks]

load media player exender this will make your dvd player work. it's in add hardware in device manager

[ogre150]

I tried the extender idea idea, no joy.  Tried the regedit and restart, no joy.  MS Fix-it, no joy.  Never tried to light scribe a dvd yet so I don't think that would matter.  Blew dust out of the tower and checked loose connections too.

I can play cd-roms just fine.  Can't read a dvd for the life of me.  Just noticed today, don't watch many movies etc. on my pc.  tried to install a new game that's on dvd and it won't read the dvd.

Have had my PC since Feb. 2008 and never had problems.  

Please help!

HP Pavilion Elite m9040n Desktop PC

SuperMulti 16X DVD(+/-)R/RW 12X RAM (+/-)R DL LightScribe SATA drive

[RasterBlaster]

This is the point where where I would yank the drive out and try it in another tower. If it still can't read DVDs, the laser is probably gone or there is something affecting the optics inside. Nice thing about towers is that you can replace components like these without scrapping the whole works.

[TheOlderGuy]

outstanding.  followed the directions and everything works now.  removing the filters did the trick.  Thanks.

[martinmm]

the babylon installer is a booby trap. i spent at least a week trying to get rid of it and it did not work.(booby trap as in malicious software.)not free !

[lian3540]

Vista not reading SimpleSave external back up drive.  Why? and how do I get it to read the drive?

[Mike_W]

I have a Pavilion a1509.uk desktop with a HL-DT-ST DVDRRW GSA-H21L CD/DVD drive.

I have always had problems with this drive: it would read some discs but would not read others etc.

I downloaded a firmware update from the HP site a year or two back (the one that has to be flashed) in the hope that it would fix the drive. Unfortunately it made matters worse. After spending weeks on and off communicating with HP support/chat etc., I just gave up and tolerated the situation. In the end they had just said that I should replace the drive as it must have failed.  A few days ago my PC  picked up an infection which I could not eliminate whatever I tried so eventually I had to do a full (back to the start) recovery. Now the drive will not read anything! Even diagnostics (PC Doctor) does not recognise that a disc is in the drive. In all cases these discs have no problems being read on our laptops (HP and Sony).

There is a serious problem within the soft/firmware that controls this drive but HP seem reluctant to recognise the fact. The support organisation just go through all the "standard solutions" and then finally tell the user to replace the drive.

This is all a very poor performance from HP and has certainly affected my opinion of what was once a class leading company.

[lian3540]

Thank you for the reply.   I've been using this drive for approximately 1 year.  

I own a small business and housed several tax and business documents over the past month on this HP Simplesave that i hadn't yet backed up.  Since I couldn't open any of my files, this drive will now cost me over $1500 for data recovery measures.  As of today, the drive was in the 'clean' room for the firm that is working to retrieve my data.   I'm hoping the data can be saved.   I'm planning to file a complaint on the better business bureau, as well as write a letter to HP.  

[mpd1]

I wish I had come across your info earlier.  I have a HP Compaq Presario SR5010 NX running Vista Home Basic 32 bit SP2.  I have one optical drive CD/DVD RW.  I have not found my problem anywhere else.  My drive continues to read and write DVDs perfectly, whether movies, games or data.  However, over the course of several months my drive would not recognize CDs in the drive.  I Purchased a games DVD and another CD games disc yesterday.  I installed both of these in my wife's HP Pavilion running XP.  I was able to install the DVD games disc  on my Vista but it will not recognize the CD game disc. 

I have tried all of the fixes you describe over the past several weeks to no avail.  MS Fix-it advised:  Trouble shooting\g is complete - We detected some problems with your system and were able to successfully apply the fixes, However. verification shows that the problem still exists.  Click next for other options.........Issue found - Media in CD/DVD drive is not readable (ATAPI DVD A DH16AYH ATA Device).............NOT FIXED.  I have gone to the earliest restore date possible, uninstalled and reinstalled my burning software, done the manual registry fixes, etc.  Any help or suggestions would be appreciated. 

[KaosHRB]

I am experimenting same problem, no reading CDs/DVDs and trying to burn a new one. I include one and said that is wirite protected. What can I do?