Windows 7: Boot Ready CDs/DVDs won't boot even after they are boot ready!

It's like the drive sees there's a disc but the photodiodes see/report nothing to read.

That is a nice explanation of the situation.

Except one thing. It did read okay that one time you put a disc in and it read a few posts back. I think the laser has to adjust it's beam pattern for the type of disc.

You might try that same disc multiple times to see if it reads every time.

Have you made sure the firmware for the drive is up to date?

If you've got multiple types (burned/manufactured/CD/DVD) of bootable discs available you might try booting all of them. See if anything is consistent.

Can it write to any disc type you throw at it?

I just have 2 types: DVD-RW and CD-R (except a manufactured movie DVD).
I tried the CDs and DVDs I had burnt before and I recently burned after realizing this problem.
It can write to both. But it doesn't read them (sees them as blank), doesn't matter if the discs is newly burnt or the ones that I burnt long ago.
There is no specific firmware on ASUS Site. This is what shows in the Device Manager:
hl-dt-st dvdram gt30n
I checked the driver also with a driver update program (external software), no update has been shown.

I tried all the CDs and DVDs that I have, nearly 50, and none of them except one that has worked, which is still working. It is a burnt DVD to DVD-RW. I don't know why it is working and the others not. So, I tried around 20 DVD-RWs back to back, and around 20 CD-Rs back to back; no CD worked and only 1 DVD has worked.
Also, it doesn't read even if this CD-Rs and DVD-RWs have been written on another computer with another drive.
And as you know it reads the movie DVD (manufactured).

Well, you know it's not a Windows problem alone, the issues you stated early on were related to booting to various boot discs, with inconsistent results. That seems to indicate a problem with the drive itself, its connection to the MB, or the MB itself.

Let's hope it is just the drive!

I think that most likely it is the drive.

You were right. The problem was intermittent. All the old and new CDs are working and booting now. I hope it stays that way.

Thanks everybody for your ideas and suggestions.

Wow! Good to hear! Knock on wood...

Can you boot them as well?

Wonder if there was some debris in there. Maybe one of those cleaning discs could have been able to resolve this afterall. Or a blast of air...

Yes, I can boot them which is very very good news.