Solved HL-DT-ST DVRAM GT30N Issues with reading disks.

[hkp7]

Maybe someone could put me out of my misery? I have a Lenovo W510 running Windows 7 Pro x64. My problem is with the optical drive, or its related software. I recently went to burn a Memtest iso in an effort to troubleshoot a display driver problem I was experiencing. The strange thing is that the iso did burn, but when it is placed into the optical drive, the windows auto start screen comes up for a blank disk (doesn't recognize that data is present). If I insert an audio disk that was burned on the drive, it does the same thing, even though it has music on it (verified by playing on a CD player) yet, if I put a commercially made audio disk in, it plays with no problems.

Anyone experience anything like this before, and can offer a solution?

 

[fireberd]

Could be a dirty laser. Clean the laser lens and see if that helps. Burned VS commercial discs require different laser light intensity. Then again it could just be a defective drive, even though it reads some discs.

 

[hkp7]

Thanks for the reply and suggestion. Cleaning the lens was the first thing I did. It wasn't really dirty, but I cleaned it anyway. Last night I experimented a little, and it can actually read disks burned by another computer/drive. It seems like it just won't read the disks that were burned on it. I uninstalled the driver, and it reinstalled showing that the drive was working properly, went through the removing upper (no upper in my case) and lower filters in the registry without any effect. This thing has got me stumped.

 

[fireberd]

There are no 3rd party drivers for optical drives (CD/DVD) just the default built in Windows drivers.

Still sounds like a problem with the drive. (I had an early i5 Lenovo). Can you take a disc that's been burned on this PC and try it in a different PC and see what happens.

 

[hkp7]

That's the problem. A disk burned on this PC works with no problem in another PC, or a CD player for audio disks, but when it is placed in this drive (the one that actually burned it), I get the blank disk message. The drive will read pre recorded CDs, and disks that have been burned on other machines.

 

[fireberd]

The only thing left is a hardware problem with the drive, since they read in other drives. This is a real possibility considering the age of the unit.

I would suspect the calibration is not being done or done properly and thus the disc cannot be read. Outside possibilities are the brand/batch of discs you are using (try a different brand) or how the discs are burned. Are you using a CD burning program or the built in Windows burning? Best to use a separate program (the free CDBurnerXP is an option) and CD-R discs, NOT CD-RW's which require higher Laser intensity, which would go back to a problem with the drive.

 

[hkp7]

I would agree but the odd thing is that disks created in other drives are readable in this drive. The last disks I burned were using InfraRecorder. The only disks this drive can't seem to read are the ones that were burned on it.

 

[hkp7]

Somehow this was marked solved? It is not, despite the assistance given. Perhaps I hit the "Mark Solved" by mistake instead of "Post Quick Reply"? If ANYONE has a handle on what this problem is rooted in, I would greatly appreciate some insight.

 

[fireberd]

As an "old time" computer tech (I'm retired and worked as a help desk manager) that has worked many drive problems (I'm a user support on the Dell forums since 2002) and I still think there is a hardware problem with the drive. If it was a Windows problem it would have problems with other discs.

 

[hkp7]

I would think that if the problem was hardware, it would appear on all disks. What kind of hardware problem would present itself on only the disks that were written by the drive itself? Kind of a conundrum.

 

[fireberd]

I'm leaning towards the mentioned "calibration". If it does not calibrate the laser properly for whatever reason it won't read the disc properly. Why only certain discs? Its not software or others would also not be read or some other OS error.

 

[hkp7]

Wouldn't a calibration, or alignment error also cause the burned disks to be improperly calibrated when they're used in other drives? The disks burned by this demonic drive play, and function in other drives.

 

[fireberd]

My take its a bad drive.

 

[hkp7]

The drive is OK. It turns out it was a result of using a different brand media than what I normally used. I was using Sony brand, and recently bought Staples. When I looked at both disks that had been burned, the Sony brand was easily distinguished by looking at it that it had been burned; not so with the Staples ones. Looks like the rest of these Staples disks will likely be used expressly for audio CDs since they work on a CD player, but can't be read from the computer.
Thanks for the patience of going through this with me!

 

[fireberd]

Glad to hear you got it sorted out. I had asked about the discs and a different batch early in the thread.