[sitontheedge]

I wasn't sure quite what section to put this in, as I'm not certain whether the problem is the result of software or hardware.

A couple months ago I noticed that the optical drive on my Vaio laptop, while still functional, was making a lot of noise ("revving up" and then stopping suddenly during reads, etc.), not reading audio CDs properly (all attempts to rip resulted in read errors, and audio playback of CDs was jerky), and playing DVDs haultingly (the audio tracks were out of sinc and distorted, and playback simply paused every few moments causing both audio and sound to be jerky).

These problems persisted across multiple programs (WMP, MPC, Media Monkey). Also, I tried using an external optical drive which worked just fine. All this lead me to believe that my hardware was going bad, so I had the drive replaced.

Initially, this seemed to solve the problem, everything worked fine once again.
Unfortunately, as of last night, my problems seem to have partially returned. Audio CD playback still works in all programs except Media Monkey (this has jerky playback when Windows Media Player doesn't, which I thought might be relevant), but DVDs once again won't play properly anywhere. I haven't tried ripping yet, and the old noises have--thankfully--not returned.

So, does anyone have any insights or suggestions? I'm a bit stumped. It seems unlikely that two drives would both be bad. At the same-time, I can't figure out what in my software could have changed in the last two weeks to cause the problem to return. I'm stumped.

Thanks for any help.

 

[thedarkwolf25]

I'm not an expert but it COULD be missing or corrupt drivers. Did you replace the drive yourself or did you have Sony do it?

 

[sitontheedge]

I'm not an expert but it COULD be missing or corrupt drivers. Did you replace the drive yourself or did you have Sony do it?

I had a local repair shop do it (my service was through Best Buy, and there was no way I wanted to be without my computer for the weeks they said it would take).

That said, I don't think the shop messed with my software at all; and, as I said, when they returned the computer to me everything was working fine. Since then I've made no driver changes (that I'm aware of). I checked the driver just now, and it says it's in good working order. Do you suggest trying to reinstall it anyhow?

 

[thedarkwolf25]

It won't hurt but as to whether or not it will fix the issue I don't know. I'm still going to school for my A+ cert so I'm constantly learning lol

 

[McNinja]

Try playing DVD's with VLC player
http://www.videolan.org/vlc/

I can't think of anything else at the moment.

 

[sitontheedge]

Well, I tried both of those things with no success. The program used doesn't seem to matter (I tried MPC, VLC, and several others), and the drive is a Optiarc DVD RW AD-7560A which, so far as I can find out, doesn't ever need a driver on a Windows system.

Any other thoughts. The problem has persisted.

 

[McNinja]

This is probably what you would need to buy

LITE-ON Black 8X DVD+R 8X DVD+RW 8X DVD+R DL 8X DVD-R 6X DVD-RW 8X DVD-ROM 24X CD-R 24X CD-RW 24X CD-ROM 2MB Cache SATA Slim 8X DVD Burner - OEM
$40
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827106260

 

[sitontheedge]

But, as I said, I already replaced the drive with a brand new one once. It solved all of the problems at first and some remained solved, but the DVD playback problem returned within weeks making me think this must be either a congenital failing of that type of drive or (more likely to my mind) a software problem.

 

[McNinja]

Is he warranty still in place might be a faulty motherboard or just the sata wire. I'm not too sure.

 

[sitontheedge]

Ok, I finally have this figured out. I just thought I'd post the solution in case anyone else has a similar problem:

The problem was that Windows had somehow changed my drive from DMA to PIO mode. To change this back one needs to mess with the properties of the appropriate (in my case the primary) IDE channel driver.

You should just be able to go in and set which mode you'd like, but sometimes it doesn't work that way. I had to un-install the primary IDE driver and then reboot, at which point windows rediscovered the software and set it up correctly.

My CDs and DVD movies now play properly in all applications.

 

[McNinja]

Well that is wierd. Well things like this do happen and I'm glad you got it sorted.