problems with DVD drive

[UmneyDurak]

Hi.
I have T42p laptop which comes with DVD/CD drive. I'm having some trouble removing the CD (DVD's eject just fine) from it. I push the eject button nothing happens, click on the icon select eject nothing happens. Only way is to restart a laptop.
This only happens in Windows XP pro, in FC4 I can eject fine.
Whats going on?

Thx.

[I4one]

hmmm...
Audio CDs only ? or data CDs as well
Internal Drive..yes?
Pressed CDs too ? (or only burnt CDR and CDRW)

perhaps your associated Media Player (in XP Pro only - the DVD player files are usually assoc. with a diff player) is hooking the files and not releasing them. Do the CDs work fine otherwise (Play, Explore, etc). It's possible the stupid shmedia.dll file is trying to create thumbnails for preview (or somesuch).

[UmneyDurak]

Hi.
It is an internal DVD/CD-RW drive. It does it with data CD's. I disabled DLA, and Recording, and it seems to work fine now. Will try few more cds and see what happens.
Not sure why disabling those two things worked.

[I4one]

hi;
DLA ?
and Recording ? :even more confused:

what i meant about the shmedia.dll file (likely other DLLs as well) also pertains to extracting META data for thumbs/preview and Ms's "Indexing" service.

On a more sinister note (just FYI), have you run RootKitRevealer on the laptop yet?

[UmneyDurak]

Hmm, no. 99% of the time I'm using linux installation. Only reason I booted in to windows this time is so I can play starcraft while I'm on the road (too lazy to install vmware on linux). I'll run it after I come back from the trip (and I'll run it on my main sytem too, might explain the wiered behavior).
The options I mentioned are when you right click on the drive and select properties. I think the recording one is there so that you can record to disk without third party software. I have the same option on my main system for my DVD burner. As for DLA, yeah I never heard of it either untill I got this laptop.

[Nemesys]

DLA = Packet Writing.

Iwould uninstall any Packet Writing software from my system. Packet Writing is the roadmap to data loss.

[UmneyDurak]

DLA = Packet Writing.

Iwould uninstall any Packet Writing software from my system. Packet Writing is the roadmap to data loss.

Why do you say that? I tried google search and couldn't find anything about it unreliably burning or corrupting data. Were you talking about the general unreliability of DVD burners that got worse because of this?

[I4one]

hi Nemesys;
good to hear from ya -- happy holidays!

thanks for the DLA explanation - i need to look up that silly acronym

I happen to just stumble upon this little gem;


it's a nice concise PDF of XP and 2K3 "Services" List and Descriptions (like blackviper.com - yet easier to read / seek / navigate).
Direct PDF d/l --> HERE

The IMAPI service may be something to follow up on UD - and i think Nemesys is saying that in 'general' - packet writing is NOT to be entrusted with 'critical' backups (many incompatabilities between UDF versions, and using CDRW media is not a wise choice either, since they're Manufactured in a diff way, and themselves are unreliable). Use CDR only, and if really, really necessary, look into DVD-RAM

-------------------------

anyway - it was while i was trying to recall this link;
http://isorecorder.alexfeinman.com/CreateCD.htm

CreateCD utility is designed as a command-line-based alternative to the GUI-based CD-Recording process in Windows XP and Windows 2003. It has several benefits:

• 1. Allows for unattended operations from batch files. A non-zero exit code is returned on failure
  2. Supports erasing CD before recording
  3. When possible, does not create an intermediate copy of the files and directories being recorded
  4. Supports creating bootable CDs. Currently boot image must be an image of a bootable 1.44MB floppy. The companion utility fdread.exe is used to create an image file of an existing floppy.

hope you find the real cause and solution UmneyDurak -- and btw, many answers to using daemon tools and alcohol 120% and such can be found over at cdfreaks.com and doom9.org. Hopefully something i posted was useful

[Nemesys]

That is a good find I4one.
One of the first tweaks I perform on a new build is to disable IMAPI CD-burning COM Service.


By DLA I was referring to Sonic DLA, a Packet Writing application provided by the burnware manufacturer Sonic.

Like Nero InCD, Roxio DirectCD or Drag to CD, InstantWrite, WriteCD and all other Packet Writing software, Sonic DLA is crap. Packet Writing is crap.

It has been known for years not only to cause problems with optical drives but to also create havoc of systems with frequent blue screens and the likes.

The technology employed in Packet Writing is extremely unreliable.

Here is a warning from 2002.........before Sonic DLA came into existence.

InCD/DirectCD - warning

[I4one]

Excellent link with mucho info (a nice read for sure).

I also wonder how many system BSODs are Sony's "RootKit" related (amongst who knows, how many others) and are causing all sorts of funky and weird problems, especially when these "rootkits" hide themselves as $sys$ "Drivers", and Embedded Nulls of 0 bytes (hidden CLSIDs)

Thanks for the "Sonic DLA" explanation and reference...now i know what the heck it is related to.

*edit;
oh btw - I am keeping that PDF for reference too ..but i'd MUCH rather learn *nix systems than to read all 72 pages of that PDF "just" to KNOW what all those Services are, WHAT they do, and How one service affects the others, and what happens when disabling some. It's reason #256 of why i dislike MS so much , just to learn a "proprietary" system, that can be used 'against' you, the Owner.

And the future, based on their past (MS's), ain't going to be no party - so i'm dumping them as soon as i can.