CD/DVD drive accesses for no reason

I have a new HP Pavilion dv7 laptop with Windows 7 64-bit OS. My question concerns accesses to the CD/DVD drive for no apparent reason. While it seems reasonable that when booting up the system the firmware will check the CD/DVD drive to see if there is a startup CD in it I do not understand other apparent attempt to access the CD/DVD drive. For example, after bootup and running within Windows 7 I attempt to play a mp3 music file on the hard disk I can hear the CD/DVD drive being accessed. Specifically, I double click on a mp3 file on my hard disk but before the iTunes application pops up I hear several clicks and clacks as the computer checks the CD/DVD player for a disk...I assume. Is there a setup file someone where this kind of activity is enabled? IMHO, the computer should not be attempting to check the CD/DVD player when attempting to play a mp3 file on the HD.

Another scenario I've noticed is during the logon process. Specifically, as the computer boots up there is a typical click-clack of the CD/DVD drive as the firmware checks to see if there is a startup CD in the drive. Next, Windows in up and running but sitting on the user logon screen. When I type my password to log onto my account I hear more click-clack accesses to the CD/DVD drive. This may be a typical thing for Windows 7...I'm not sure as I'm new to Windows 7. However, the description I gave above concerning playing of mp3 music seems odd.

Can someone give me a run down of when the CD/DVD drive should normally get accessed beyond the obvious situation of popping a CD into the drive or when making deliberate accesses to the drive by browsing etc?

As part of the booting process, an optical drive is part either to be check on POST along with the hard drive and other components. http://www.computerhope.com/issues/ch001263.htm . However on normal operations such as basic browsing or accessing the hard drive, the CD/DVD drive should not have any activities.

Are you sure that your not hearing the hard drive spin up? They can often be noisy (noisier usually then an empty optical drive spinning up) and located near the optical drive. To find out simply leave the optical drive open for awhile while using the computer-if the noise continues then it is your hard drive, which is normal, if the noise stops then it is your optical drive, which may indicate a malware infection.

Thanks for the quick replies.

The click-clack sound definitely is not the hard drive starting up. It is clearly the CD/DVD drive being accessed. The sound is not too different that the click-clack you'd typically hear from one of the old 3 1/4" flex drives. I imagine the sound that I hear is the laser tracking motor moving the laser pickup from the outer edge to the inner edge and back to check to see if a CD or DVD is sitting in the drive. Any ideas on how to figure this out?

BTW, the click-clack sound that I'm hearing is the same exact sound I hear if I open the optical drive then close it without inserting a disk.

Edited by SyberTiger, 05 January 2012 - 08:27 PM.

Is your system set to boot from the optical drive?

MS FixIt

Louis

Is your system set to boot from the optical drive?

MS FixIt

Louis

No, but even if it was it would not explain why double clicking on a mp3 file would make the optical drive track motor move the laser head.

Perhaps if still under warranty, I would seek replacement to save the trouble.

Perhaps if still under warranty, I would seek replacement to save the trouble.

I've only had this laptop for around 30 days. I have up to 90 days to return it or exchange it. I might have to take your advice. It's not a super huge big deal but rather an annoyance to hear the optical drive trying to access an empty drive even though my actions are to play an mp3 file on the hard disk. The one thing I did notice is that if you put a DVD/CD in the drive you don't hear the click-clack sound when either booting up nor when you try to play a mp3 file on the hard disk. Clearly, the OS, for whatever reason likes to check to see if there is media sitting in the optical drive on certain occasions.

I chatted online with the HP online customer no-support group. As is typical they were no help at all. They had me delete the Upper/Lower filter entry in the registry associated with the optical drive. Of course that did nothing but make my iTunes application unhappy so I had to uninstall it. The problem as originally described still exists when trying to play a mp3 file using Windows Media Player. Obviously, this isn't anything related to iTunes. It is some sort of OS/driver issue. I imagine that the drive isn't doing a thing until the OS allows it. I can't believe this is a optical drive issue as the optical drive functions flawlessly. The problem is the OS/firmware/driver/software related. I wonder what it is about double-clicking on a mp3 file contained on the HD causes some piece of software to then the optical drive to move the laser tracking motor. The motor by itself isn't doing anything until told to move by a piece of software that is triggered somehow by my attempt to play an mp3 file. BTW, the mp3 file plays just fine when either iTunes or Windows Media Player pops up.

I'm pretty sure you have no issue at all, especially concerning media players. You might have a 'recently played' playlist that includes something from a cd or the program itself is checking all sources for media when it first starts. Frankly I'd let that one go. If it really bothers you, you can capture a boot trace and submit for a look-over.

Use Autoruns to list startup programs.

• Download the .zip file and extract to a folder on your desktop. Open that folder, right-click autoruns and select Run As Administrator.
• Autoruns will begin scanning immediately. Press Esc to interrupt it.
• Click Options > Filter Options and check Hide Microsoft Entries. Click OK
• Press F5 to begin a new scan.
• When it is finished, click File > Save and save the report to your desktop.
• Locate the report on the desktop, right click, select Send To > Compressed (zipped) Folder. A new archive will appear on the desktop.
• Attach that archive file to your next post.

=======================================================

Use Process Monitor to capture boot operations.

• Download and extract to a folder on your desktop. Right-click on program and select Run As Administrator.
• The ProcMon filter dialog box will appear. Click Reset and then OK.
• Process Monitor will begin capture. Immediately press Control + E to stop. Press Control + X to clear log.
• Click Options > Enable Boot Logging.
• An options dialog will open. Check Generate profiling events. Select Every second.
• Close Process Monitor and restart computer.
• As soon as possible, rerun Process Monitor. It will ask to save the collected data. Click Yes. Save to your desktop as bootlog.
  
  • Depending on the size of your log, Process Monitor will create several files named "bootlog", "bootlog-1", etc.
• Download 7-zip and install.
• Select every bootlog file on the desktop, right-click on one of them and select 7-Zip > Add to "bootlog.7z". Do not select Add to "bootlog.zip".
• Locate the new archive on your desktop and upload to a file-sharing site such as Mediafire.
• Copy the file's weblink to your next reply.

Edited by LucheLibre, 06 January 2012 - 06:59 PM.

I'm pretty sure you have no issue at all, especially concerning media players. You might have a 'recently played' playlist that includes something from a cd or the program itself is checking all sources for media when it first starts. Frankly I'd let that one go. If it really bothers you, you can capture a boot trace and submit for a look-over.

I appreciate the look-over. Here are the Autoruns and boot trace files:

http://www.mediafire.com/?sem7lna6dm7t4l9,jm8w9fwf812852f,cwm4c13h3gynygq

Which drive letter corresponds to your your DVD drive?

Which drive letter corresponds to your your DVD drive?

Drive F:

BD-ROM Drive (F:)

I think what I'm seeing is Explorer.exe pinging the drive to see if its a burner so it can add it to its list.

Haven't really dug in to see why it would do it each boot. But you don't have to worry about it.

Edited by LucheLibre, 07 January 2012 - 09:01 PM.

I'm probably just going to return this laptop for another one that hopefully doesn't have this issue. The "clunk-clank-clunk" sound is annoying to me. It happens when I run other applications too...just a one time thing when I open the app. But still, why put up with it when it's a brand new computer.

Since you are going to return it, Once you back up anything, why not try a system recovery back to like new and see if the problem is software related. I do not believe it to be hardware related


http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/Document.jsp?lang=en&cc=us&taskId=115&prodSeriesId=3744231&prodTypeId=321957&prodSeriesId=3744231&objectID=c01895783#RestoreWithoutWindows

NOTE: 	

System recovery 

Press the Power button to start the PC, and then press the f11 key when the standard BIOS prompts are displayed on the black screen.Pressing the f11 key during startup on a computer with an HP factory image will start the system recovery process even if the prompt is not displayed.

    If the HP Recovery Manager can access the recovery partition on the hard drive, a prompt to backup the user files before beginning the recovery is displayed. Follow any on-screen instructions.

Edited by rotor123, 09 January 2012 - 01:04 PM.