My stepdad's computer won't play any new cds it will not read them, what's going on? yet most cds that came with it it will read?

Is the cd rom going bad or is it something else??

he runs Windows 98.

Hello, and Welcome to D-A-L.

"My stepdad's computer won't play any new cds it will not read them"

Are these "new CD's" factory (original) CD's or burnt CD's? Depending on the CDROM, only newer ones will read CD's other than original. The problem may be that the drive is an old one. (Quite possible on a 98 system.)

As a check, first determine if the problem is hardware or software related. If the bios "sees" the CDROM on a cold boot (it will be listed in the second (POST - Power On Self Test) screen when the system is booted), that much of the hardware is OK. (This seems to be the case as you stated that the drive reads certain CD's.)

Boot with an EBD (Emergency Boot Disk). If you don't have one you can download one from my webspace here*.

When booting, choose with CDROM support. Load a first party data (not music or burnt) CD into the drive. A Microsoft 98 CD will do perfectly. When you get to the A:\> prompt, type in dir x: (where X: is the CDROM device letter assigned to the drive near the end of the boot process - see below.) If you get a directory listing of the CD, the hardware aspects of the system and the drive itself are OK and functional. Therefore the problem lies within the O/S (Operating System).

Post back with the results and any further info/questions and we'll take it from there.


*The above bootdisk image file is a self extracting file and has to be executed (run) from a running Windows(9x) machine in order to create the actual startup diskette on one of your floppy disks. (This image file produces the same bootdisk which 98SE creates.) This downloaded image file will format the floppy disk to ensure its integrity, write the files to the disk, then verify the file write, so it'll take a minute or three to create the bootdisk.

Ensure the floppy drive is set as the first boot device in the bios. http://www.d-a-l.com/articles/library/23.html

NOTE: When you boot a machine with this boot floppy, it creates a RAMDRIVE in system memory to contain DOS system tools/drivers. Thus it will move your "normal" CDROM device/drive letter "up" one level. (If your CDROM is normally E: it will be F: when booting with this bootdisk.)

We've tried both the burnt cds didn't work and the original cds didn't work.

but I will try what you suggested and post back.

"yet most cds that came with it it will read"

and now;

"and the original cds didn't work"

It's a possibility that the drive lens may need to be cleaned. Inexpensive CDROM cleaning disks can be purchased at most computer stores.

However, it's also possible that the drive (if it has a few years on it) may be dying. I just had to buy a new CDROM for my back up machine. It would read only sometimes, and also wouldn't eject unless I pushed the button two or three times. I paid $24.00 Cdn for a new LiteOn 52X. The cleaning kit may approach that price so.......

Give the DOS level test a try first though.