How to repair a CD/DVD/RW drive that isn’t woking - Zatara

How to repair a CD/DVD/RW drive that isn’t woking.

The first thing I would do is check the “Device Manager” for the drive. Go to the Control Panel, in the search type in “device manager.” If you are in Windows 8, press WIN+R and type “control” then press OK. It will be listed under “CD/DVD Drives”. If you do not see this listing then you CD/DVD drive has a more serious problem. If you do see your CD/DVD drive listed below, right click on it and choose uninstall. When it asks you to delete the driver’s, choose no. Now reboot you’re computer and test the CD/DVD drive to see if it works. You can do this by going to my computer and see if a CD/DVD is detected.

If it still doesn’t work restart your computer and get into what’s called the BIOS. You’ll have to google your computer and see what button to press on startup to get into the bios. DEL, F2, F10, and F12 are just a few of the common button to press to get into the BIOS. Inside the BIOS find drives and see if the CD/DVD drive is detected in there. If any of the ports are disable in the BIOS enable them. Exit and save changes and test the CD/DVD drive when you get back into Windows.

Okay so you’ve done that and the CD/DVD drive doesn’t show up. Step one print out this page. Step two power off your computer. Touch the metal case with your bare hands to get rid of any static electricity. Then unplug all devices from the computer, including the power cord. Now that everything is disconnected open the case up. There are so many different cases each one opens up different. Some have thumb screws, some have Philips screws, and some have buttons to press. Usually one side of the case will come off and all the electronics will be visible.

Don’t worry you can’t plug anything in wrong or backwards as long as you don’t force it. Everything is keyed so it can’t be plugged into the wrong slots.

Quick explanation of all the parts. This assumes you have a desktop PC.

Motherboard or Mainboard – this is on the back and is the largest circuit board. It has the processor and memory mounted to it.

Processor: This is easy to find because it has a large heat sink and fan mounted to it. Sometimes they only have a heatsink.

Memory: This is located near the processor and looks like small boards that are long with chips on them.

Video Card: You may or may not have a video card depending on how expensive you system is. This is the card that is extending outward and has an LCD plug on the outside.

Hard disk: Square shaped device that is usually silver or black. It has a large sticker on it stating it specifications.

Power supply: It is a large box that has all the power cables coming from it.

Now find the CD/DVD drive. It should have two cables going to it. One is a data cable, called a Serially attached scsi (SATA), which is usually red, but can be any color. It’s about ¼” thick and flat. The power cable has four wires, red, black, black, yellow. Unplug the SATA cable from the motherboard and plug in

back in firmly. Then do the same thing on the hard disk side. Also unplug the power cable and plug it back in firmly. You can also try using a different power cable.

Close your PC case. Plug everything back in and test the CD/DVD drive. It should now be working now. If it isn’t, you probably have a failed CD/DVD drive. Order a new one from amazon for cheap. Such as this Asus drive for $20.

This tutorial is dedicated to Zatara.

if an internal cd rom etc aint working its generally cheaper to just not bother to reconnect it back to the motherboard and use an USB one, these days the trying to mess around with an optical drive and to try and correct a failure is only for those who have very specific needs for burn speeds like getting a solaris 8 boot disk to burn and boot from an external drive etc

a reply to: lobograndemalo

As someone who works in IT. I don't even fix cd/dvd/rw drives anymore. I just replace them.

a reply to: Krazysh0t
Replacing a DVD/CD Drive with no troubleshooting?
a reply to: Maxatoria

Guys these posts aren't really for IT people. These are for those who don't work in the IT field and need a basic troubleshooting guide. In fact I would be insulting you if i pretended these posts are for you! So please don't insult me. If you have something to add such as, "an external is a great option." Please do.