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February 20th, 2006 00:00

My Dimension 4400 CD/DVD Combo Drive is not working properly or does not show up at all

Hi,
 
My CD/DVD combo drive is action packed with issues lately. I don't know if it's because it's almost 4 years old or if it's because of some MS service pack upgrade or Norton messing around with it but it seems to be getting rather senile.
 
Problems to date:
 
Has not been able to read cd's it previously could such as music cd's, software installation discs, data cd's.
 
Sometimes the D drive does not show up at all not even under the device manager.  Rebooting seems to fix this.
 
The auto play and/or auto install feature quit working a while ago.
 
Sometimes the drive gets so jammed up trying to internally sort out what it's supposed to do with the disc I just inserted that it freezes everything on the computer and not even the on/off button will fix it. The only solution has been to physically crawl under the computer and unplug it. Not good I know but what can you do when it's just plain stuck and nothing else works?
 
I don't really know if the DVD drive is working properly. I rarely watch movies on it and to date I have only been able to burn vcd's. I have Ulead DVD Movie Factory 2 and it does not seem to want to burn any DVD I have tried.
 
I write that last part because I am not sure what part of the burner is having the problem, dvd or cd.
 
My specs say that I have two components:
 
9K689 - CD Drive
6M479 - DVD+RW
 
Please let me know if there is any more information that you need and I will try to provide it.
 
I don't want to have to buy a new drive if I can avoid it especially if the DVD burner is actually still good and it's just the cd part that's fried.
 
My warranty is long over. I could sign up for the 4 year extended but it will only give me another 3 months of service. Not sure if it's worth it.
 
Has anyone else experienced these problems and if so what was your fix for them?
 
Sincerely,
 
Retro Diva

4 Operator

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34.2K Posts

February 20th, 2006 11:00

Go to device manager and expand CD/DVD drives and write down both model numbers there. Post back when you can.

4 Posts

February 20th, 2006 14:00

Hello,

This is what I see from the Device Manager:

DVD/CD-ROM drives

     - PHILIPS DVD+RW-D01

Under the properties it seems I have controls for both the cd and dvd drives so it seems that it is a single drive. But there is no additional part numbers listed in the properties or other information tabs. The last driver was installed on 7/01/01 and is listed as 5.1.2535.0.

I found a mention of an updated drive on Dell but I am not sure if that is what I need and I had a bad experience once installing a driver that was incorrect and it was the only time I have ever fried a computer. So I am a little leery to install new drivers now unless they are an update that has been prechosen for me by the device. Like in a pop up that says "new updates are availalbe".

Here's the link to the drive update announcement.

http://support.dell.com/support/downloads/download.aspx?c=us&l=en&s=gen&releaseid=R59173&formatcnt=1&fileid=72111

Thank you in advance for any assistance you may be able to offer.

 

4 Posts

February 20th, 2006 14:00

Please ignore this post my computer freaked out and posted it twice. The real reply is one post down.

Message Edited by retrodiva on 02-20-2006 10:45 AM

4 Posts

February 20th, 2006 14:00

Please ignore this post my computer freaked out and posted it twice. The real reply is two posts down.
 

Message Edited by retrodiva on 02-20-2006 10:45 AM

4 Operator

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34.2K Posts

February 20th, 2006 16:00

Looks like the right one to me.
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