What reads disks. DVD won't read disc

Why doesn't it work dvd drive on windows laptop 7 and what to do in such cases?

After experimenting with the drive, I identified the five most common reasons why the DVD drive does not work on a Windows 7 (XP, 8) laptop.

What to do to correct it is described under each of the reasons below; of course, others are not excluded, but these are individual problems.

Reason one

On an asus laptop or any other computer in Windows 8 or Windows 7 (no difference), the disk drive does not work because its earthly journey has ended (this happens too).

This is a rather extensive answer, but it happens and so you cannot do without a replacement. It’s good if you can remove it and try it on another computer.

What to do? Buy a new one and replace it, they are not expensive today, about 15 dollars. There are no difficulties in replacing it, you can do it yourself.

Remove a few screws and disconnect the two cords. That's all.

Reason two

What to do? Enter the BIOS and turn on the DVD drive. Usually it is there opposite the CD-ROM line. ENABLED - ENABLED.

Third reason

If the disk drive stops working, the reason may be Windows itself. The system simply doesn't see it.

This is usually driver related. You can see them in the device manager. How to fix it?

Install new (correct) drivers in Device Manager and update the configuration.

Fourth reason

Fifth reason

The laser head has failed. There are many reasons why this happened.

What to do? Replace, although it is better to replace the drive completely - the laser head is expensive (80% of the cost of the drive)

Of course, the five reasons described in this article are not all possible options Why is the disk drive not working?

This could be a lack of power supply, bad contacts on the cables, and much more.

Then it is much easier to check which element affected the performance of the drive.

As an option, remember that you can always use an external drive or flash drive - today they are quite capacious and allow you to easily install even operating systems.

Only if the content is on DVD, then you won’t be able to do without a disk drive. Good luck.

In this article I will talk about the reasons why a laptop does not read the disk or does not see it, or simply does not want to spin the disk in the drive. Let's figure out what to do.

This article is suitable for all brands that produce laptops on Windows 10/8/7: ASUS, Acer, Lenovo, HP, Dell, MSI, Toshiba, Samsung and others. We are not responsible for your actions.

Software reasons why the laptop does not read discs

A user may encounter a problem when his laptop does not read discs. There may be several reasons for this malfunction, each of which has its own solution.

The following are distinguished: software reasons:

• The problem appeared after installing some programs. Most often, these are programs for burning discs or for working with virtual discs: DaemonTools, Alcohol 120%, Nero and others.
• Discs stopped being read after reinstalling Windows.
• Automatic or manual update drivers.

There is a way to make sure that the cause of the breakdown is really software. Let's take it boot disk, set the BIOS to boot from disk. If the boot process is successful, then the drive is working.

In this situation, you need to try to remove the software that is supposedly causing the problem. If this helps, then we find an analogue or use a different version of this program. Rolling back the system to an earlier period can also help.

Driver Update

If the disk drive in the laptop does not read discs after updating the drivers, then you need to perform the following instructions:

Virtual disks

If in the same section of the device manager there are virtual drives disks, they should be removed. Subsequently restarting the laptop will solve the problem.

Drive type in Windows 7

There is another option to force the laptop to read the disk if installed Windows system 7:

• Go to the device manager, select “IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers”.
• Items ATA Channel 0, ATA Channel 1, etc. will be displayed in the list. Go to the properties (right click, select properties) of each of these items. In the section " Additional options» pay attention to the line “Device type”. If you are using an ATAPI drive, then you need to try unchecking or installing “Enable DMA”. Then we apply the changes, after which we reboot the laptop and check disk reading again. This item should be enabled by default.

If only DVD discs cannot be read, then there may be an incompatibility between the drive and the disc itself. This often refers to cheap blanks of dubious quality.

Hardware reasons

In the vast majority of situations, the problem is related to the hardware. In these situations, at first the drive reads only certain blanks, and then refuses to read them at all. Here's what you can do:

Very often the computer does not have enough memory to store all the accumulated information. With filling hard drive there is a need to transfer data to other media. Flash drives are expensive, but disks, in comparison, cost pennies.

But even here problems may arise; discs may suddenly become unreadable by your drive. This article will tell you about possible reasons breakdowns and will help solve the problem.

Why did the drive stop reading discs?

There can be many reasons for this, ranging from problems with the disk to complete failure of the disk drive. However, all the reasons can be divided into two categories, hardware and software problems.

Hardware problems are caused by problems with the hardware. The following problems fall into this category:

1. The cause may be the disk itself; its wear can be so severe that no disk drive can read it.
2. The drive may no longer accept discs due to contamination. Over the entire period of operation, it accumulates inside the computer. large number dust that may enter the drive and settle on the read head.
3. Loose connecting wires will also affect the performance of the device.

These are the most common hardware problems; determining which of these led to the failure can only be done “surgically”, that is, you need to get into the system unit.

With diagnosis software problems much easier. If problems appear after installing some software, then we can talk about software incompatibility.

Solutions to hardware problems reading disks.

Is your drive not reading discs? Don’t rush to throw it away and run to buy a new one. First, check the condition of the disk inserted into the drive; if it is in poor condition, then the reason may lie in the damaged disk, and not the drive. Remove the disc from the drive and inspect it for scratches and abrasions.

If everything is fine with the disk, then we move on. It's worth testing the drive on other drives different types: CD, DVD and small miniCD. It is recommended to use the newest disks for the test.

Don't forget about other hardware problems, open the lid system unit and carefully check the connection between the drive and the motherboard with the connecting cables. If there is no obvious damage, still try to connect the drive using other available cables. And for prevention, clean the drive from dust and dirt. This can be done using special disks.

There is another way to clean the read head, but this option is for more experienced and confident users. This method involves disassembling the drive and cleaning the laser with water or high-quality gasoline. Never use cologne or other alcohol-containing liquids, or acetone to clean the laser. Their use will lead to disastrous results.

Have you cleaned the drive, checked its functionality on other drives, and tried to make it work using other cables, but it still refuses to read the drives? Don't be upset. You can move on to solving possible software problems, and consider all the above actions to be preparatory.

Solutions to disk reading software problems.

If you discover that the problem is not due to hardware reasons, remember what you did with your computer earlier, what you installed, changed and deleted. Because you might have accidentally deleted or changed files that are necessary for the drive to function.

To fix it, you will need to reinstall the device drivers necessary for normal and proper operation devices in the system. Driver mismatches or errors in them can cause the drive to refuse to read discs.

In addition, you can turn off the drive using operating system and then reconnect. For Windows this is done in the system properties.

My Computer window

In the window that appears, click on Device Manager.

System Properties window

The manager finds your drive and then removes it.

Removing a device

After removing the device, you must restart the computer so that the system can detect the drive again and automatically install the appropriate drive for it. software, that is, drivers.

Often the reason malfunction The drive becomes third-party software installed to emulate virtual drives. Such programs include: DAEMON-Tools, Alcohol 120%, etc. All of these programs can cause your drive to malfunction. If you have these programs on your computer, remove them one by one, and test the drive after each removal.

To remove you can use CCleaner program, it not only removes programs from the computer, but also cleans the system from unnecessary files And system records remaining after uninstalling the software. The process of cleaning system entries is called cleaning the registry.

In practice, there were cases in which the solution to the problem was to flash the device. But this action can lead to complete failure of the drive. So, before taking these measures, it is highly recommended that you read the following point.

Solving the problem using the MicrosoftFixit program

Sometimes after another reinstallation of the operating system Windows systems The drive stops opening only DVD discs, while CD discs still open normally.

This also does not mean that the drive “died”, because before reinstallation it was functioning properly. The most important thing is that this issue is resolved with the help of free and effective program MicrosoftFixit.dvd.Run. You can download the program from the link:

Load window

Troubleshooting Results Window

After which the media contents window will open or a dialog box will launch containing several available options for operating the disk. If none of the above happens, then open the disk manually using the My Computer shortcut. Thus, the MicrosoftFixit program easily solves the problem of failure to read DVDs or CDs.

And if this doesn’t help, then you can already think about buying a new drive. For greater understanding and optimal choice new drive, it is recommended to consult with specialists.

Conclusion

After reading this article, you will have the opportunity to try to fix problems with the drive yourself, one by one, first eliminating possible hardware causes, and then software ones. Applying the methods given in this article. It must be remembered that self-fix may result in bad results, therefore, you should not neglect the help of qualified specialists.

To understand the reasons why the laptop does not read disks, it is necessary to analyze the situation - how exactly did the malfunction occur? What events preceded the problem?

If the computer has been in use for a long time, it is logical to assume that the power of the laser beam has decreased significantly over time. In this case, the drive usually first stops writing information to the discs, and after a few months it becomes impossible to play it.

Some types of disk drives have an option to increase laser power. For this purpose, there is a special adjustment screw on the body. The problem is that laser amplification will force the equipment to work in a forced mode and this will soon lead to the final destruction of the laser source.

If the discs are not only unreadable, but the tray does not open at all, it can be assumed that there is no power to the device. There could be several reasons for this.

• The contact in the connecting wires is broken. You need to turn off the computer, perform an external inspection, disconnect and reconnect the power and data cables.
• Malfunction of the motherboard or south bridge.
• The tracks on laptop boards are very thin and often burn out. Short circuit most often occurs after liquid gets on the laptop keyboard. Burnt tracks and contacts can be detected visual inspection. Some advanced users even repair gaps in tracks on the motherboard themselves.
• If the laptop has not been charged for a long time, the battery may not have enough power to normal operation some power-consuming computer devices. To check this version you just need to connect charger to the laptop and wait a while.

The disk drive could break, and not only at the laser level. The test is usually carried out by installing a known-good analogue or installing the problematic unit in another computer.

Software problems

Sometimes a situation where the laptop does not read discs is caused by the operation of certain applications, such as Nero. If you have previously created any virtual disks on the computer, the system could switch to them, and the physical drive seems to disappear from general list connected equipment.

To find out if the drive is connected, you need to open Control Panel and view the list of connected devices. If the problem is with your disk management software, the physical drive may not be listed in the hardware list, but virtual disks will be shown.

To begin with, you can try simply removing the virtual disks and turning on the physical drive. Possibly after reboot DVD reading and CD media will be restored.

Next probable cause consists of incorrect operation device drivers. How can you reinstall the drivers if the drive does not read and use a set of files with installation distribution Windows impossible? All that remains is to search necessary drivers on the Internet. The best way is to go to the official website of the manufacturer of the type of drive that is installed on your computer.

If you are not sure which drivers are required, you can go another, simpler route. Download and install from the Internet special program, which automatically analyzes the computer system and checks the availability and relevance of drivers.

The utility itself will check the availability and functionality of drivers and then automatically find and install them. Alternatively, you can start the system automatic update OS Windows, in the general process will be installed and fresh drivers for optical drive.

Problem with BIOS settings

For some reason the laser drive was disabled at the basic level BIOS settings. Go to CMOS settings and check. If it says that the drive is unavailable, you just need to re-enable it by selecting Enable instead of Disable from the drop-down menu. Then restart Windows. Even easier - reset BIOS settings default. If you did not do anything special with the BIOS settings, such an operation will not harm the performance of your computer.

The computer is infected with viruses

If you are an active Internet user, like to visit little-known sites, often install new programs, follow links to emails, the probability that the computer will receive a portion harmful viruses very large.

First you need to check the system. Enable antivirus scanning. After removing infections, the antivirus usually prompts you to restart the operating system for a final repair.

If after an overload the disks are still not readable, it could very well turn out that your digital horse got a really serious illness that severely destroyed the operating system. Viruses often destroy significant system files, disguise themselves under their names.

In this case, without hard formatting disk and new installation OS Windows is indispensable. In less dire cases, it may be enough to simply roll back Windows to one of previous states. Go to the System Restore interface and find control point, when, as you remember, the laptop still played laser discs.

Some models of laptops and netbooks have a system rollback function to factory settings. In this case you won't even need to use a bootloader Windows disk, which is just not readable.

Despite the fact that the use of CD/DVD drives is gradually giving way to other methods of reading information, nevertheless, for a number of operations it is still quite relevant, for example, for installing an operating system stored on a disk. Therefore, the failure of this device can be very inappropriate. Let's figure out what causes the drive to not read discs and how to solve this problem in Windows 7.

We will not focus on such a banal reason for the problem of reading information from optical drive, as a defect in the disk itself, but let’s focus on malfunctions of the drive and the system. Among the main causes of the problem we are studying may be:

• Drive hardware faults;
• OS failure;
• Driver problems.

Below we will look various ways solve the problem in as much detail as possible.

Method 1: Solving hardware problems

First of all, let's focus on solving hardware problems. The reason that the drive does not read discs may be due to its failure or incorrect connection. First you need to check the connection of the cables to the SATA or IDE ports. They should be inserted into the connectors as tightly as possible. You can also try reconnecting the device to an alternative port (usually there are several of them). If the cause of the problem lies in the cable itself, you can try cleaning the contacts, but it is better to replace it with a new one.

However, it is quite possible that the drive itself is broken. One indirect confirmation of this may be the fact that it reads DVDs, but does not read CDs, or vice versa. This indicates defects in the operation of the laser. Malfunction can be expressed in various forms: from failure of microcircuits due to overheating to dust settling on the lens. In the first case, you cannot do without the services of a professional technician, but it is even better to purchase a working CD/DVD-ROM. In the second case, you can try to clean the lens yourself with a cotton swab. Although for some device models this is quite problematic, since they are not designed by the manufacturers for disassembly.

Method 2: Enable in Device Manager

However, even a working drive can be disabled due to some kind of failure or intentional actions. "Device Manager". Therefore it is necessary to check this option and, if necessary, activate the drive.

1. Click "Start". Go to "Control Panel".



2. Go to "System and Security".



3. Now press "Device Manager".



4. Will start "Device Manager". In the list of equipment, click on the name "DVD and CD-ROM drives» . If this name does not appear or the drive name does not appear when you click on it, this means either a hardware failure of the drive or it is disabled. For the procedure in the first case, see Method 1. If the DVD/CD-ROM is simply disabled, then the problem can be solved right there.



5. Click on horizontal menu "Action". Choose "Update hardware configuration".



6. Will be produced new search devices.



7. After that click on again "DVD and CD-ROM drives". This time, if everything is fine with the drive hardware, its name should be displayed.

Method 3: Reinstalling drivers

The next reason why the drive may not see the disk is incorrect installed drivers. In this case, you need to reinstall them.

If this method didn’t help, you can use specialized ones.

Method 4: Uninstall programs

The problem with reading discs through the drive may be caused by the installation individual programs, which create virtual drives. These include others. Then you need to try to remove this software, but it’s better not to do this using Windows tools, but by using specialized applications, for example, .

1. Run Uninstall Tool. In the list that opens in the application window, find the program that can create virtual disks, select it and click "Uninstallation".



2. After this, the standard uninstaller of the selected application will launch. Act according to the recommendations displayed in its window.



3. After removal Uninstall program Tool will scan your system for the presence of residual files and entries in the register.



4. If uninstalled items are detected, the Uninstall Tool will display a list of them. In order to completely remove them from your computer, just click the button "Delete".



5. After the procedure for removing residual items is completed, you need to exit information window indicating the successful completion of the procedure by simply pressing a button "Close".

Method 5: System Restore

In some cases, even if the above programs are removed, the problem with reading disks may persist, since this software has managed to make the appropriate changes to the system. In this and some other cases, it makes sense to roll back the OS to a restore point created before the described malfunction occurred.

1. Click "Start". Go to "All programs".



2. Go to the directory "Standard".



3. Open the folder "Service".



4. Find the inscription "System Restore" and click on it.



5. Will start standard utility OS recovery. Click "Next".



6. The next window will present a list of restore points. Select the most recent one that was created before the drive problem occurred, and click "Next".



7. In the next window, to start the recovery procedure to the selected point, click "Ready".



8. The computer will restart and the recovery procedure will occur. After this, you can check the drive for functionality.

As you can see, the reason that the drive has stopped seeing disks can be various factors, both hardware and software. But if there is a hardware problem regular user is not always able to decide on his own, then when software errors There are algorithms of action that almost everyone can operate.