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Cannot Play DVD

Started by aw9018 , Mar 02 2009 01:57 AM

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14 replies to this topic

#1 aw9018

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Posted 02 March 2009 - 01:57 AM

I recently reinstalled XP Home, and now the DVD ROM drive will not play DVDs. CDs are played in Windows Media Player, software can be installed using the DVD ROM drive but a DVD is not recognized. With a DVD inserted double clicking the drive in My Computer brings a message to please insert a disk in Drive E. It used to be possible to play movie or TV show on DVD in this drive. I tried uninstalling the device from device manager and rebooting, causing it to reinstall but the problem continues. The drive is a Samsung SD612.

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#2 Platypus

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Posted 02 March 2009 - 07:00 AM

software can be installed using the DVD ROM drive but a DVD is not recognized

Do you mean software can be installed from a DVD, but a DVD movie isn't recognized? Or has all software been installed from CDs?

If the latter, can the drive copy a file from DVD, or better, can the drive boot the computer from a bootable DVD such as a Vista install DVD or a Linux Live DVD such as is often given away as a computer magazine cover disk? If the drive can't read a DVD to boot from, then usually the DVD section of the dual laser has failed.

Pleased to have been a Microsoft MVP (Windows Desktop Experience) 2007/8, 2008/9

I pressed F5, and I'm feeling refreshed...

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#3 SLIX

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Posted 02 March 2009 - 09:21 AM

Hi aw9018

I recently reinstalled XP Home

Windows XP does not contain the codecs to play DVDs. Your original installation must have had a 3rd party DVD player installed which contained the codecs. Once these codecs were installed, Windows Media Player could utilise them to play DVDs. By reinstalling Windows you have lost the codecs and will need to replace them before you can play DVDs.
If you had a third party player such as WinDVD then you must reinstall it and you will find that Windows Media Player will start playing DVDs again.
If you do not have a third party player then try downloading and installing VLC Media Player here: http://www.videolan.org/

Steve

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#4 aw9018

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Posted 02 March 2009 - 10:39 AM

Thanks for assisting. All software installed since reinstalling XP using this device has been from CD. What I omitted from my original post was that I did install InterVideo WinDVD from the CD that came with the PC (it came preloaded). The PC is about 8 yrs old and so is the WinDVD disk. I don't know if a lack of updating is the problem. I will now try using the media player you suggest and see if that works.

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#5 DaChew

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Posted 02 March 2009 - 10:47 AM

8 years is a long time for a dvd-rom drive, dvd's are hard to read

Chewy

No. Try not. Do... or do not. There is no try.

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#6 aw9018

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Posted 02 March 2009 - 11:04 AM

I agree but it was working fine before the reinstall of XP. I have now tried VLC media player both with and without menus with the same result. The following are the messages I got:

VLC is unable to open the MRL 'dvd://E:\'. Check the log for details.
Your input can't be opened:
VLC is unable to open the MRL 'dvdsimple://E:\'. Check the log for details.

If the problem is hardware, then I'll have to either install a new device or live without DVDs on this PC. The HDs are new and so is the memory and video card but the DVD ROM has never been replaced. Is there anything else I should do to rule out a software problem?

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#7 SLIX

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Posted 02 March 2009 - 11:36 AM

Hi

Something about this installation has to be different from the original.
Have you applied all the Service Packs and Windows Updates?
I can't see that the following would have any bearing on the problem but you could try updating the firmware on your DVD drive (assuming it isn't already up-to-date).

Steve

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#8 aw9018

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Posted 02 March 2009 - 03:11 PM

I installed SP3 and all updates. I also tried updating the firmware for the drive from the Samsung site, but when I attempted to install the firmware I got a message that said DMA mode not supported switch transfer mode to PIO mode and attempt to flash the drive. I am not familiar with these "modes."

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#9 DaChew

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Posted 02 March 2009 - 05:18 PM

http://www.malwareremoval.com/tutorials/safemodeboot.php

Use safe mode for ide burners when you flash them, make sure the drive is empty and you have the right firmware

Safe mode will put ide in pio mode, which is slower and safer

Chewy

No. Try not. Do... or do not. There is no try.

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#10 Platypus

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Posted 02 March 2009 - 08:30 PM

Have you tried to boot from a DVD? There's no point spending a lot of time trying to do firmware updates and faultfinding the software side of the installation if the drive has simply failed.

Pleased to have been a Microsoft MVP (Windows Desktop Experience) 2007/8, 2008/9

I pressed F5, and I'm feeling refreshed...

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#11 aw9018

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Posted 02 March 2009 - 09:25 PM

I have not tried to boot from a DVD, but that sounds like a good way to determine whether this is a hardware problem. Unfortunately, I don't have a bootable DVD. I do have another PC available to me with a DVD burner running Vista. Could you recommend a way to create a bootable DVD?

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#12 DaChew

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Posted 02 March 2009 - 10:24 PM

I would suppose most vista dvd's are bootable, a burned one would be even harder to read

Chewy

No. Try not. Do... or do not. There is no try.

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#13 aw9018

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Posted 03 March 2009 - 09:41 AM

Since I don't have a bootable DVD and I didn't see any harm in updating the driver for the DVD ROM drive, even though it is in safe mode, I did it and it installed successfully. Unfortunately, DVDs are still not recognized when inserted in the drive. The timing of this problem with the reinstallation of the OS seems too coincidental but I guess I have to assume it is the hardware unless anybody has another suggestion.

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#14 aw9018

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Posted 04 March 2009 - 03:37 PM

Just to provide closure: I gave up on the original drive, bought a $20 DVDRW from the clearence section at a local electronics store and installed it. It's working fine, thanks for your help.