Disc drive acting strangely

I have been having a strange problem with my disc drive lately.

It's a multi-drive, so should be able to read both CDs and DVDs...and it did, up until a couple weeks ago. Now, it will read blank, burned, and commercially produced CDs, but in terms of DVDs, it will read blank discs only. I am able to burn DVDs, but after the discs are burned, my disc drive won't recognize them.

It strikes me as odd, because if it will burn the DVDs, why won't it then recognize or play the DVDs immediately afterwards?

Does anyone have any ideas? Could it be that the lens is dirty? Or would that cause it to not recognize ANY DVDs?

If anyone has any advice, it would help me out a lot. Thanks!

Edited by computergeek522, 15 February 2010 - 04:21 PM.

I'm sure you will get a lot of solutions concerning your problem.

But one I have found which is commen problem, is dust buildup on the optical lense.

I'm not sure what you have this device in as far as as a computer goes.

But if it is a tower or desktop PC, you will have to open the tower and remove the drive.

I am not sure if you are the type to perform such a task.

If you are, then let us know and we will guide you safely as to opening your PC and removing the drive.

Then you will have to open the optical drive as well to clean the laser lense.

There are some optical drive lense cleaner CD's out there with a brush on the disk that makes contact with the lense for a few brief moments, but those do not always work well enough.

Edited by MrBruce1959, 15 February 2010 - 05:46 PM.

I have a laptop -- a Gateway T-1413h -- so it shouldn't be too difficult to clean the drive. I know the type of disc cleaner you're talking about -- I've bought them for my DVD player before, I just don't have one right now. I'll pick one up and see if that does anything for it....hopefully it will work.

Thanks for the input!

I have a laptop -- a Gateway T-1413h -- so it shouldn't be too difficult to clean the drive. I know the type of disc cleaner you're talking about -- I've bought them for my DVD player before, I just don't have one right now. I'll pick one up and see if that does anything for it....hopefully it will work.

Thanks for the input!

You're welcome!

If this does not work, your laptop optical drive might be removeable externally, it just pulls out after pushing the release lever. (makes it easier to work on)

The object would be to get a cotton swab dampend with alcohol to the lense and gently wipe the lense. Use the dry side to dry and buff the lense.

Try reading or burning that disk format again.

If this does not work, please post back and let us know.