I have an HP DVD-RW 640b that will no longer acknowledge any disc that I put in it. At first I thought it was just blank media but I've found it is also burned discs and commercial film DVDs. I can open it up and put the disc in obviously and the green "thinking" light blinks like normal, but that is all. I'm running XP Media Center. I've already tried updating the drivers but no new ones were available. Thanks in advance.

Hello Mike, Welcome to PCHF.

When you go to My Computer, and double click on your DVD-RW drive from there, do you see any files listed, or do you receive and error message?

Thanks for having me. When I click on the drive under MyComputer there is just a plain white screen where the thumbnails should be. It's very strange that I get no response at all to any disc being in the drive.

Hi Mike,

Great, if the drive shows up in My Computer, then it's very very likely to be a hardware as apposed to a driver issue. Either the heads of the drive are dirty or worn. If they are dirty, then it's just a simple matter of using a cleaning CD. If the heads are worn or damaged, then your best bet is to replace the DVD drive completely.

You can purchase CD lens cleaning kits from many supermarkets and hardware stores. You can also purchase them on-line, for example: Read Right RR257: CD ROM Lens Cleaner | OfficeWorld.com

If it is the hardware then that is fine, it's about three years old. The funny part is that I was in the process of burning the very first disc from a brand new stack of discs when it failed. In the past I know that I had to update the firmware sometimes when I got a new stack, so I guess this was just a coincidence, right? Thanks again.

Any time. It could have just as easily started the fault mike as well. Marked as Answered.