Win7 PC sometimes doesn't recognize undamaged audio CDs inserted into CD/DVD tray

I use a Windows 7 computer at work. It is a Dell Optiplex 3020 purchased in April, 2016. i5-4590 CPU @ 3.30 GHz, 8 GB RAM.

I borrow a lot of audiobooks on CD from the library. They all have multiple CDs - anywhere from three or four for thinner books up to 30+ for fat ones by Stephen King and other champions of verbosity. Most audiobooks average 8 to 12 CDs, I'd say.

At work, while working, I rip the CDs one after another to my C: drive so I can then drag and drop them to my mp3 player via USB. Usually this works fine. But sometimes, I have a day like this morning.

Arrived at work. Unlocked computer that I restarted before leaving work the night before.

Inserted audio CD into CD/DVD tray as always. Launched Windows Media Player to rip CDs as always. WMP said something like "insert disc". The usual list of tracks on the freshly-inserted CD did not appear, and WMP said something like "insert disc".

Browsing via Windows to My Computer also indicated the computer saw no CD in the tray.

I restarted. Same as before.

I restarted again. This time I was able to rip two CDs as usual, but then the computer wouldn't recognize the third CD. It might have been my imagination, but I thought the two CDs I was able to copy ripped more slowly than they usually do.

I restarted. CDs still not recognized.

Before I restart yet again or say to hell with it and do this at home instead, I thought I'd post here in case this sounds familiar to anyone.

Obvious things I've checked:

The CD/DVD tray goes in all the way and clicks shut as it should.
A green light blinks and I can hear the CD spinning as usual, whether or not Windows recognizes it
I've been around CDs long enough to recognize ones that are scratched, chipped, and otherwise physically damaged. These particular discs look excellent.

Any ideas?

Thanks.

Update: after some searching online, I have gone to my Device Manager, where I see a HL-DT-ST-DVD+-RW GTA0N ATA Device.

Clicking on Properties gives me a window that says "This device is working properly."

Despite this bold claim, I'm quite sure it is not working properly.

And now I see I may be done, since the other things I am supposed to try per google, such as uninstalling and reinstalling the driver require someone with administrator access. Oh well...

Okay, final update and then I'll quit griping about this. Just restarted, ripped two more CDs, and now it says "No disc in drive" again after I inserted the third CD of this latest attempt.

I wonder if anyone would notice if I reformatted the hard drive and installed the Ubuntu OS? :cool:

When it's not reading a certain disc, will it read any others?

I suspect the drive has failed, but it's not for certain.

That is correct. Once it's in "non-reading mode", I can open and close the CD/DVD tray with any number of different CDs inserted and it seems like Windows7 and Windows Media Player don't react at all.

More strangeness: I had a meeting this afternoon and just for one last time today, I restarted before leaving my office for a while. Now I'm back and ripping the fifth CD in a row with no problems. And that's a good thing, since the second audiobook is one I've been looking for for months and just snagged yesterday evening between home and work - the latest Jack Reacher novel, "Night School".

It could be a few things from a bad driver to bad firmware, but it's most likely bad drive. It's not all that uncommon on those chassis.

Fair enough. Thanks for the information. I may have ripped more CDs in the last year than a basic business computer is designed to handle.

For what it's worth, I just got through six discs in a row before it went "dormant" again.

HULK SMASH! http://www.bikeforums.net/images/smilies/crash.gif

Yeah, this sounds a lot like how my previous LG blu-ray drive was behaving. It was definitely a hardware fault - it reported itself as working fine, but clearly something was wrong with it as swapping the drive fixed all the issues.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by George

I have gone to my Device Manager, where I see a HL-DT-ST-DVD+-RW GTA0N ATA Device.

Clicking on Properties gives me a window that says "This device is working properly."

Despite this bold claim, I'm quite sure it is not working properly.

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Don't mean to laugh, but I found this funny. That is so Windows. :lol:

Since optical drives don't have anything like SMART, it's really not Windows so much as optical drives.