CD-RW/DVD+-R combo drive can read CDs but not DVD?!!

[amish]

I have Samsung CD-RW/DVD+-R combo drive (SH-M522)

It is showing weird problem.

I am able to read and burn CDs But its not able to read DVD.

I tried with Data DVD and tried with Movie DVD too. Both are not detected. It says "No medium found". Same Movie DVD works in some Dell laptop with Fedora 10.(so cant be OS problem)

I have hardly played DVD on it except once, abt 6-7 months back.

Few months back I changed my motherboard, can it be mother boards fault?

Can it be cable fault? I myself plugged the cable, since I am not a hardware guy, do we have to plug more than two cables? Power and data.

Can it be lens fault? But then how CD-RW is working fine?

Any suggestions? Thanks.

Google-ing doesnt give convincing answers.

 

[Sushubh]

i think a dvd writer has multiple lenses for different format drives... i have had similar experiences in the past and replacing the drive is the easiest solution. and yeah... all the time the drive was rarely used. on my Dell... i have gotten the drive replaced 3 times till now and i have used it for like 5 times in the last 1.5 years.

 

[amish]

yes me too, sometimes i dont use CDs for 5-6 months straight. past 3 yrs, i must have purchased 3 drives. they all go bad in a year.

 

[dark_horizon]

My friend had a similar problem a year back. He showed it to an engineer, who upon checking suggested to replace the lens. My friend instead bought a new Dvd writer. Cost of changing the lens - Rs 400. Cost of new DVD writer - Rs 1100. Plus you can burn dvd's unless on a combo where you can only read them.

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If you do not use the drive much, it is suggested you keep a cd/dvd in it all the time. Every time you start the system, it automatically reads the drive, and hence keep your lens in working condition.

 

[Sushubh]

dunno. some people say its a bad practice to keep a disk in the drive always. other says the opposite.

time to check if my Dell's drive is working at this moment. i bet it might be dead by now. got it replaced 3 months ago.

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it read the ubuntu 9.04 disk i got.

no patience to find a dvd disk to check 🙁

 

[amish]

I am planning to open the drive and clean the lens 😀

 

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[dark_horizon]

You get lens cleaner cd's in market. Not sre if it really works though.

 

[amish]

will those CDs clean DVD lens too? or there is separate DVD for that too?

 

[zeo]

Can it be cable fault? I myself plugged the cable, since I am not a hardware guy, do we have to plug more than two cables? Power and data.


As far as I remember there are in total 3 cables coming out from a Combo drive. Power, data and the third one is a thin 2 wire cable which also fits in the motherboard (I've Samsung CDRW/DVD Combo SM-352F).

Maybe my combo drive is bit old (around 5 years) that's why it is having 3 cables. Newer drives may have 2 cables. Even I'm not a hardware expert to tell that :grin:.

 

[amish]

Yes, 3rd one is for audio CD actually. I will have to open my comp to see if 3rd cable is plugged or not.But is 3rd cable (if its there in my drive) necessary? Because its anyway an audio CD cable and shud not matter for VCD or DVD or data CD