Gaming Laptop won't read DVD-R?

[WeeBabyDoll]

Hey everyone,
I have been having real trouble with my wii (off topic, I know, but I will get there) in that it won't read alot of the discs I have burnt recently.
I have been racking my brains, and other peoples, trying to fix the problem but I just havent been able to fix it.
Anyway, I downloaded Opti Drive Control 1.48 to see if it could point out any problems with my drive. I was looking through the drive info, it says all supported types of media - and there is a big fat cross next to DVD-r. How the hell coud that be?? It was reading them fine a few months ago. I had an accident with my laptop which caused the screen to smash - and had to send it away to my insurance company to get repaired - could they have messed about with it? Please someone help me - this is really pissing me off.

Just checked and drive F won't read the DVD's, but drive E will....

 

[luckwii]

The drive may have gone bad. Especially if you burnt a lot of discs on it.

Try uninstalling and then reinstalling the drive drivers. Hopefully that is all it is. Try the drivers from both the DVD drive and the laptop manufacturer.

Worst case is that you have to run an external DVD drive. They are cheap. Or, crack it open and do an internal swap.

 

[WeeBabyDoll]

Well I am trying to update my drivers in DriverMax, will also try downloading from the manufacturer. As I said, drive F wont read DVD-r but drive E will (or so it says) and I have been using drive E. I burnt some normal CD's on it a few weeks ago and they seem to work fine, but (maybe it's a long shot) but my games for the wii won't seem to work, I get error 1269, other times I get to the safety tips screen and then it wont read the disc. This happens with games I have done recently (including Fifa10) but not with games I have done previously (i.e Darts)
I have no idea how to do an internal swap..
How would I go about uninstalling the dvd driver??

 

[WeeBabyDoll]

Just went into the control panel to see if the driver was up to date, and it says it is...should I still uninstall it?

 

[George Dawes]

CD/DVD drives don't really use "drivers", so uninstalling it will do nothing.

What model dvd drive do you have in the pc?

 

[WeeBabyDoll]

My CD-ROM/DVD drives are

ITSF KHERGDQJ8 SCSI CDROM device (doesnt read DVD-r)
TssTCorp CDDVDW TS-L633C ATA Device (does read dvd-r)

Is that the info you need?

 

[George Dawes]

Is the "ITSF KHERGDQJ8 SCSI CDROM " a real drive? That seems like the type of info an app that creates virtual drives would use. Do you have any idea who the manufacturer of the drive is or any model markings on the drive itself?

 

[prowler]

My CD drives only can read DVD's properly. It won't write to discs or read CD's properly.

How old is it? It might just be dying out.

 

[WeeBabyDoll]

My laptop is less than 1 year old, but I have burned over 20+ games and maybe 4 cds.
I can't really see any marking on the DVD slot itself, except the usual -
DVD multi recorder
Compact disk re-writable
RW - Dvd Rewritable

I have Deamon Tools installed on my laptop, I suppose that would create the drive?

 

[WeeBabyDoll]

I use ImgBurn to burn my games, maybe if I download Nero or something it will work?

 

[Kryptical]

I use ImgBurn to burn my games, maybe if I download Nero or something it will work?

Still haven't gotten your games to work on your Wii yet?

ImgBurn is recommended for burning. As luckwii said, you might need to get an external DVD Drive.

Oh yea, can you tell me if your games work via NeoGamma? I would like to know if you can play at least some games.

 

[Originality]

It is advised to disable virtual drives in any case where you are not loading from your image files (in your case, D-Tools is exactly where it comes from, and explains why it can't read DVD-R). It can consume crazy resources (depending on a number of things) and cause havoc with programs not used to virtual drives.

DVD drives generally don't use drivers since it's mostly automated, but it does use firmware. IMGBurn will tell you what firmware you're running (next to the Drive model number). To find an update, you just need to google your drive number and look for any released patches. These firmwares usually go between 1.0-1.5, but certain drives also have custom firmwares built for them going under names similar to RC1.

Updating firmware is generally not recommended unless you are confident in how to use a computer. A failed update can, in some cases, brick the drive. I myself have failed a few times in updating certain drives, but I've always found some way to get back to 1.0 and try again.

One last word of advice. If at all possible, never burn console games (360 or Wii) from a laptop DVD drive. I've never discovered why, but laptop drives rarely bitset correctly and have a distinctly low chance of success when burning DVDs. Good software can correct these mistakes, but the Wii and 360 are not known for using good software. Use a good desktop (or even external) DVD drive instead.

 

[aphirst]

When I first read the thread title I thought:

"Oh, this is just like what happened on my old laptop after a year or so. I sorted it out by giving the internal lens a proper cleaning."

However, your problem sounds as if it may have more to do with Windows, or drivers. I've personally never heard of a DVD drive physically *losing* the ability to read/write specific types of media...

If the machine were mine, at this point I'd probably try running a Linux distribution off of a USB key, and then trying to burn a DVD-R from that.

 

[Am0s]

I got an ASUS drive and mine doesnt read cd's but it reads and writes dvd's just fine, you could try updating the firmware of the drive see if that resolves the issue, if not I guess the drive is broke and you would need to replace it.

you could try playing with aspi drivers updating or whatever