Toshiba Satellite M45-S165 running XP SP2.
CD+-/DVD+- Drive is Mashita DVD-RAM UJ-840S

My drive will no longer recognize CDs or DVDs. Gives an error

In My Computer, I see "DVD RAM drive (D" when there is no disc in the drive.

If I have a CD disc in the drive, I see "CD Drive (D and it tells me to insert a disc in the drive. If I put a DVD in the drive, I can hear it trying to read the disc but it goes to "CD Drive (D" again with the DVD-ROM icon for the drive.

I had been recently using DVD Shrink, AVI2DVD, DVD Drcrypter and VSO DivxToDVD. I don't know if any of these caused a problem. I have removed the AVI2DVD program (uninstall) and have rebooted my system.

Any ideas? Good thing I bought an extended warranty! Hopefully it doesn't come to replacing the drive, though.

I've also tried to go to DVD-RAM folder in Programs and clicked on DVDForm which just listed the drive was "in use" whether or not there was a disc in the drive.

Very irritating! Any suggestions?

Hi anibob, this is normally a hardware problem. The only thing I can suggest is that you use a cleaning disk on the drive to make sure there is no dirt on the heads.