Bought an external DVD drive to rip my CD collection.

Plug it in and it shows up fine in My Computer.

However, if I put a Cd in it, I cannot access it. Comes up as it’s either corrupt or not formatted.

Strange thing is, when I click on Properties, it seems to have assigned my SSD to the drive as well. Screen grab below.

Is it borked or can I fix it to avoid the hassle of returning?

image album upload

The hardware tab is fine, it’s just showing all your drives (if you then click on the DVD drive and select properties it should bring up the DVD specific properties).

It might sound obvious, but you are putting the CDs in the correct way around (it’s always been read side down for me but who knows)?

Failing that, try another usb port; I have some troublesome devices (my Garmin Oregon for one) that only work on certain ports on my hub.

Indeedy as Pjay posts, try a different USB port or even better another computer (they supply different voltages iirc). Also your trying to access audio cd’s? Have you tried testing your audio ripping software (or just media player), to see if it recognises the cd?

Thanks Gents.

I have tried it on different USB ports and a different computer and still the same.

It’s going back.

Have you tried different CDs? Some have DRM stuff going on that stops computer drives from reading then

was an issue with some slot loading Macs that drm stopped the computer ‘seeming’ the disc and resulted in difficulty in persuading the computer to eject it.

How is it powered? Some CD/DVD players that are external need a bit more juice if they’re getting their power via USB (if externally powered please ignore). As a result you sometimes get USB cables with *two* USB-A connectors on so it can pull power from two ports instead of one to get it enough current espeically if USB2. USB2 can deliver up to 500mA but USB3 can give 900mA.

sorry ‘seeing’ not ‘seeming’

What Adam said. You’ll probably either need to connect two USB cables – they often have a Y-cable with two plugs – or an external power supply.

And as PJay said, that Properties tab is normal behaviour.

Thanks for all the help but it’s definitely faulty.

What Adam said. You’ll probably either need to connect two USB cables – they often have a Y-cable with two plugs – or an external power supply.

I had an older one that needed 2 connections, not sure where it’s gone, hence the new one. This one has no way of doing that. It has a single hard wired USB cable and no additional power supply cable or socket.

Mine sometimes behaves a bit like that but rebooting the PC fixes it (for a while), not sure what’s causing it (rarely use it so haven’t bothered spending hours trying to find out…).

Have you tried assigning a different drive letter to the DVD drive.

From your original post, both the DVD drive and your SSD seem to be assigned with Z:

Plug the drive in

Right click This PC/My Computer on the desktop

Click Manage

On the left hand side under storage, click Disk Management

On the bottom panel, find the DVD drive and right click,

select ‘Change Drive Letter and Paths’

Click change, and select a different one (e.g X) and then click ok.

You may need to reboot to make the change ‘stick’

Have you tried assigning a different drive letter to the DVD drive.

Why?

From your original post, both the DVD drive and your SSD seem to be assigned with Z:

Nope, that’s normal behaviour. The Hardware tab on Properties lists all drives. Here’s mine:

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