disc drive has stopped working!?

[Tyre kicker]

Hi,
I'm wondering if anyone can help.
My disc dive on my laptop has stopped working, the disc spins inside the drive, but when i go to rip a cd windows media player says a disc drive is required!
This is also the case when i was trying to burn a dvd, using nero and dvd architect. The drive is not recognised. (from the drop down menu)

Any one have any ideas?

I have tried the troubleshooting (XP) guide but to no avail.

I would be greatfull for any help

Cheers
Ben

[batninth]

Tyre Kicker,

I'm assuming it is the optical drive you're talking about here - pretty sure from what you say but want to be absolutely certain.

Is the drive one of those that you can eject out of the laptop & switch for a floppy drive - I had one like that in an IBM Thinkpad. If it is I would suggest you try reseating it by ejecting it & putting it back in securely.

Next step for me would be to look at the BIOS settings and make sure that the BIOS is recognising the drive. There are usually help screens to give you guidance, its a matter of catching the laptop as it first boots to get to the BIOS.

After that it starts to get serious. If the BIOS doesn't recognise the device try adding it, but things like that don't normally change on their own & I would be starting to think about getting it professionally checked.

If however the drive is showing in the BIOS then I would let the laptop boot. Again I'm assuming here that it is Windows XP you're running, and I would go to control panel, and then look under Hardware to see if the drive is accepted by the device manager. The Microsoft web site will give you some clues there.

Good luck with it - let us know how you get on

[Tyre kicker]

hi,
its the cd/dvd drive, and not the type you can replace often. (i think).

i'm running XP, btw.

sorry to sound like a dick, bUt how do i enter the bios settings!

Thanks for your help

TK

[carholme]

Sir;

If you are unfamiliar, do the simple things first. If you double click "My Computer" icon on your desktop, does the drive show up? If it does, can you click on it and open it from there?

Also, right click on the same "My Computer" and select Properties which will open up a System Properties page, select the Hardware tab at the top and then select Device Manager. Scroll down to the drive you are seeking and click on it to see if you can at least get access to it. If it has an yellow exclamation mark or other warning flag attached, that will give you an idea if there is a problem. If you can get in here, there is a simple Troubleshoot button and you can attempt a fix there.

Let us know if you get this far and what happens.

Regards

carholme

[green granite]

In nero there is a box for setting which drive you wish to use, make sure it's pointing to the optical drive and not the hard drive.