Member Avatar for Ty274

I have a Windows XP Toshiba laptop and lateley my CD burner has'nt been working. I tryed using three seperate programs so far (Windows Media Player, Drag'n Drop CD+DVD, and Realplayer) to burn audio tracks or data to a CD, but they haven't worked. Everytime I start up my computer I get a message that says something like "to enable DVD burning, you must disable CD burning. Would you like to disable this feature? (yes/no). I click no but CD burning still does not work. Same thing if I click yes. I get this message whenever I try to burn a CD too. I also tried using the control panel to disable DVD burning (Control panel\System\System Properties\Hardware\Device Manager\DVD/CD-ROM Drives\MATSHITA DVD-RAM UJ-811) by configuring the property, "device usage", to disable. This too was to no avail. Also now my CD drive isn’t working for some reason although my DVD drive still works. Can anybody help me out with this please?

  • 3 Contributors
  • 4 Replies
  • 183 Views
  • 17 Hours Discussion Span
  • Latest Post Latest Post by crunchie

Dani AI

Generated

Brief expert summary tied to the posts: described a Windows XP laptop with a single combo optical drive where multiple burning programs fail and a persistent "enable DVD/disable CD" type dialog appears; after trying those toggles the CD side now reports an I/O error when a disc is inserted. correctly clarified this is a combination drive, and pointed to a related thread with overlapping diagnostics.

Quick triage (software vs hardware)

  • Try several known-good discs (one commercial audio CD and a blank CD‑R). If none are read, listen for spin/noise and note whether the drive appears in the BIOS.
  • If the drive is missing from BIOS, suspect hardware failure.
  • If BIOS sees it but Windows does not or shows errors, it is most likely a driver/filters or packet‑writing conflict; check Device Manager for warnings and inspect the System event log for atapi/cdrom errors.

Practical fixes to try (in roughly this order)

  1. Remove packet‑writing software (InCD, Roxio DirectCD, Sonic DLA or similar) via Add/Remove Programs and reboot. Those tools commonly cause the kind of "enable/disable" dialog and conflicts.
  2. Back up the registry, run regedit and navigate to
    HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class{4D36E965-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318}
    Export the key first, then delete only the UpperFilters and LowerFilters values if present (do NOT delete the whole key). Reboot.
  3. In Device Manager, uninstall the optical drive (or the DVD/CD-ROM node), then scan for hardware changes or reboot to let Windows reinstall drivers. Also confirm the "IMAPI CD‑Burning COM Service" is not disabled.
  4. If transfer mode fell back to PIO, reset IDE channel drivers (IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers) so the channel can reinitialize in DMA.

When software fixes fail

  • Try a known‑good external USB optical drive to confirm laptop software is healthy.
  • Persistent I/O errors with BIOS detection usually mean the drive’s laser/servo is failing; replacement or service will be required.

The above sequence covers the usual XP-era causes; backing up the registry before edits is essential. The related thread mentioned has similar diagnostics and is worth checking for additional context.

Recommended Answers

All 4 Replies

Member Avatar for RKemp

I'm not sure I understand your post correctly. Do you have a laptop with a DVD burner AND a separate CD burner or is it one of those combination drives that is supposed to burn anything?

Member Avatar for Ty274

Its a combination drive I beleive. Also my CD drive isn't working now, probably because of my fiddling around.

Member Avatar for Ty274

Also, I dont know If this helps or not but when I click on my D drive in My Computer when I have a CD in, I get the message:

"D:\ is not accessible. The request could not be completed because of an I/O device error."

Be a part of the DaniWeb community

We're a friendly, industry-focused community of developers, IT pros, digital marketers, and technology enthusiasts meeting, networking, learning, and sharing knowledge.