cd rom

alcav · May 03, 2007, 08:11:56

Hi all....

I have rather a strange fault with my cd rom drive,it will only read some discs fully,some it will say some of the files are corrupted and some ,it will not read at all.

Any ideas anyone? many thanks......Alan

DorsetBoy · May 03, 2007, 08:17:17

Well a lens cleaner may well help BUt a decent one is as much as a new drive.

Cd roms are being virtually given away these days, take a look at www.dabs.com www.komplett.co.uk

or Maplins/EBuyer etc.

Maplins were having a clear out last week and they had CD drives on the table at only £9.00.

Edit..Here you go CDROM from Dabs only £7.63! LITEON

alcav · May 03, 2007, 08:25:13

Thanks Dorset boy,is this the way they go then?intermittent reading,I have never had one pack up before now

I must admit,I don't use it much though. Regards.....Alan

DorsetBoy · May 03, 2007, 08:36:22

Yup,I have had them go like that,even with little use.
A few years back I would have cleaned and lubricated etc but it really is not worth mucking about with them.

The only other thing to check is that the driver is not corrupted.

Rik · May 03, 2007, 08:37:26

It's pretty much what happens, Alan. I've had a couple of DVD drives go where they will start corrupting writes at a particular sector on the disc. I suspect it happens if the drive is not used fully, by when I mean start to finish of a full disk, very often. It 'feels' like detritus builds up on the tracking mechanism and it's enough to put the laser out when it ventures into uncharted territory.

As Dorset says, the drives are so cheap these days, they're virtually consumable. My first 1x CD-ROM, otoh, cost me £500!

Glenn · May 03, 2007, 08:40:25

I change 2 or 3 a month at work for the same reasons

alcav · May 03, 2007, 17:17:41

Many thanks folks

you sure can rely on plenty of help on this forum.The thing that puzzled me was that it reads the more recent discs ok,not so the older ones,but then It don't take much to puzzle me!'I guess I will start looking for a new drive when I have got my new router up an running. ::)I seem to be spending more time trying to get operational rather than flying my flight sim these days

Kind regards to all.......Alan

Rik · May 03, 2007, 17:38:25

Hi Alan

If gunge had built up on the tracking mechanism, it probably means that recent disks will be recorded slightly out of place, and so play, while the older track will the in the right place and get missed. After a while, you come to understand that computers are devices that we are all enslaved to. They are supposed to be great productivity tools, in practice they demand more maintenance than my house, car and teeth put together.