XP won't CD or DVD!

February 24, 2005 11:02 AM

Whenever I insert a new disc into either my (internal) DVD drive or my (USB external) CD-burner, Windows XP Explorer refuses to refresh itself with information about the new disc: still shows the old disc's name, double-clicking brings up the content of the old disc (or tries to autorun), etc. Only thing that fixes the problem is to reboot with the new disc inserted. Why, and what's the solution?
posted by WolfDaddy to computers & internet (4 comments total)

That's weird.

If it were my PC, I'd format.
posted by Jairus at 12:13 PM on February 24, 2005

This may or may not work, but the only thing that comes to mind is uninstalling the drive in question from the Device Manager, then reboot. Plug and Play should then detect the drive and possibly install more correct drivers.

Oh, and perhaps fiddling with the "Auto Insert Notification" attribute of the drive in the properties window of the drive (also from the Device Manager) may or may not have some effect.

I assume you've already tried refreshing in Windows Explorer. (f5)
posted by recursive at 12:50 PM on February 24, 2005

Here's a couple things to try:

1. Delete the CD-ROM driver, and re-install it.
2. Replace the CD drive cable. There is a line in the ribbon cable from a removable drive called a "mode sense line." It is for notifying the operating system when a disk has been inserted or ejected. Since the cables are pretty cheap ($3 from a discounter), it's a cheap test.
3. It's always possible that the drive is simply not notifying the operating system, in which case the only fix would be to replace the drive.

For whatever its worth, if you have an Explorer window showing the contents of the a drive, pressing the F5 key will force it to refresh -- if the drive has changed, the windows contents should be replaced with those of the new drive.
posted by curtm at 7:49 PM on February 24, 2005

I have no advice to offer of any substance. All I can say is since I bought my Mac Mini, I haven't touched my PC. It burns CDs and DVDs with out fail. Also, it doesn't crash, get viruses, spyware, adware or pop-ups. It's pretty sweet.
posted by Livewire Confusion at 5:24 AM on February 25, 2005