Scheduled Maintenance: We are aware of an issue with Google, AOL, and Yahoo services as email providers which are blocking new registrations. We are trying to fix the issue and we have several internal and external support tickets in process to resolve the issue. Please see: viewtopic.php?t=158230

 

 

 

[SOLVED] Dysfunctional DVD Drive

Need help with peripherals or devices?
Post Reply
Message
Author
User avatar
f.r3d
Posts: 75
Joined: 2016-07-28 16:39
Location: France
Has thanked: 4 times

[SOLVED] Dysfunctional DVD Drive

#1 Post by f.r3d »

Hi everyone!

I hadn't used the DVD drive of my laptop in a while and I just realised yesterday that I cannot read CDs/DVDs anymore. I am wondering if it is a hardware problem or a software problem. I don't know where to start, what should I do?

Thank you for your help!
Last edited by f.r3d on 2017-05-08 19:12, edited 3 times in total.
Debian 11 Gnome 64bit
Thinkpad T460
4X Intel Core i7-6600U / 8GB Ram / Intel HD Graphics 520 / 256GB SSD /

User avatar
pylkko
Posts: 1802
Joined: 2014-11-06 19:02

check the logs

#2 Post by pylkko »

the answer to your question is almost always: "in the logs". If there indeed is a hardware problem, then there will likely be a "fail" message in dmesg or elsewhere right after you try to read a disc. Components with moving parts are often the first ones to fail. Optical drives are amongst the parts on old computers that fail and need repair/replacement.

User avatar
f.r3d
Posts: 75
Joined: 2016-07-28 16:39
Location: France
Has thanked: 4 times

Re: Dysfunctional DVD Drive

#3 Post by f.r3d »

OK, so how do I do that ? I have never checked the system logs nor dmesg before.
Last edited by f.r3d on 2017-05-08 13:42, edited 1 time in total.
Debian 11 Gnome 64bit
Thinkpad T460
4X Intel Core i7-6600U / 8GB Ram / Intel HD Graphics 520 / 256GB SSD /

User avatar
GarryRicketson
Posts: 5644
Joined: 2015-01-20 22:16
Location: Durango, Mexico

Re: Dysfunctional CD Drive

#4 Post by GarryRicketson »

You need to make some effort on your part, to learn how to administer your system.
How to check the system logs on Debian 8

Some of the results are not very up to date , but this one :
https://unix.stackexchange.com/question ... art-issues
I have never checked the system logs nor dmesg before
http://www.linuxnix.com/what-is-linuxun ... to-use-it/
Or simply type :

Code: Select all

man dmesg
at the terminal command prompt.

Code: Select all

dmesg | less 
The above command will print out the contents of dmesg and allow you to scroll through the output just as you did viewing a standard log with the less command.

User avatar
dasein
Posts: 7680
Joined: 2011-03-04 01:06
Location: Terra Incantationum

Re: Dysfunctional CD Drive

#5 Post by dasein »

f.r3d wrote:I hadn't used the CD drive of my laptop in a while and I just realised yesterday that I cannot read CDs anymore. I am wondering if it is a hardware problem or a software problem.
If it's truly a CD drive (and not a DVD drive), then hardware becomes a distinct possibility. What's worse, CD-era optical drives tend to have proprietary interfaces, which makes swapping out drives impractical.

And that's the core of what you need to do: vary either hardware OR software and see which one fails. If you have a USB optical drive, or can borrow one, use that to rule out hardware. Alternately, boot from a live medium using a totally non-Debian distro. You don't necessarily need a full desktop OS with every bell and whistle; just a minimal install and (optionally) a light DE/WM of your choice.

But before you start downloading .isos and all, there are a couple of things worth trying first...

- Look in your BIOS to verify that the drive is recognized at the hardware level
- Boot your machine and do a quick ls -l /dev/cd* at the CLI to verify that the drive is recognized by the OS
- if all your testing so far has been with data CDs, try a couple of commercially-burned music CDs

One last thought: given how inexpensive DVD drives are these days, you may decide that it's not worth your time to do a detailed differential diagnosis (particularly if your drive is a true CD drive). There's a wide array of external USB DVD drives available online for under $30USD.
Last edited by dasein on 2017-05-08 13:36, edited 1 time in total.

User avatar
f.r3d
Posts: 75
Joined: 2016-07-28 16:39
Location: France
Has thanked: 4 times

Re: Dysfunctional DVD Drive

#6 Post by f.r3d »

My bad, it is a DVD drive (I meant "CD" in a generic way). I will look into what you all sent me.
Debian 11 Gnome 64bit
Thinkpad T460
4X Intel Core i7-6600U / 8GB Ram / Intel HD Graphics 520 / 256GB SSD /

User avatar
eor2004
Posts: 251
Joined: 2013-10-01 22:49
Location: Puerto Rico
Has thanked: 4 times
Been thanked: 5 times

Re: Dysfunctional DVD Drive

#7 Post by eor2004 »

In my experience laptop CD/DVD drives don't last very long, there's a high probability that is a hardware failure, the good news is that you can get some cheap internal or external drives from Amazon or eBay, just make sure that the seller has a very good feedback before buying.
Debian 12 Gnome on a MSI H61M-P25 (B3) PC & on a Dell Latitude E6410 & HP EliteBook 8540p Laptops.
LMDE 6 on a Panasonic ToughBook CF-C1 Laptop.
Bodhi Linux 7 on a HP Compaq DC5750 Small Form Factor PC.
Windows 11 on a Intel DH55TC PC.

User avatar
phenest
Posts: 1702
Joined: 2010-03-09 09:38
Location: The Matrix

Re: Dysfunctional DVD Drive

#8 Post by phenest »

How do you know you can't play them? Have you tried and got errors? If so, can you post the errors here, and what program gave them. It could also give clues.
ASRock H77 Pro4-M i7 3770K - 32GB RAM - Pioneer BDR-209D

User avatar
f.r3d
Posts: 75
Joined: 2016-07-28 16:39
Location: France
Has thanked: 4 times

Re: Dysfunctional DVD Drive

#9 Post by f.r3d »

OK so here is what I have tried so far. I booted on a live usb with Fedora and when I inserted a music cd, it didn't show up, nor with a software cd (with a windows software on it for a dictionary).
What I mean by "my DVD drive cannot read a CD/DVD" is that when I insert a CD/DVD on Debian, nothing happens. There is no pop up (on Gnome) asking me what to do and it does not show up in nautilus (even in /media). I hear the disc spinning, "erratically" I would say and then nothing, it just stops spinning.
The BIOS of my laptop is normal. Nothing that would hinder the normal functioning of the DVD drive. It even appears as a boot option.

Code: Select all

frederic@frederic-laptop:~$  ls -l /dev/cd*
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 3 mai    8 20:09 /dev/cdrom -> sr0
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 3 mai    8 20:09 /dev/cdrw -> sr0

Code: Select all

frederic@frederic-laptop:~$  ls -l /dev/dvd*
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 3 mai    8 20:09 /dev/dvd -> sr0
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 3 mai    8 20:09 /dev/dvdrw -> sr0
Debian 11 Gnome 64bit
Thinkpad T460
4X Intel Core i7-6600U / 8GB Ram / Intel HD Graphics 520 / 256GB SSD /

User avatar
phenest
Posts: 1702
Joined: 2010-03-09 09:38
Location: The Matrix

Re: Dysfunctional DVD Drive

#10 Post by phenest »

Lets first check to see if it's mounted. If it has, there should be contents visible in /media/cdrom/.

Also, post the output of /etc/fstab.
ASRock H77 Pro4-M i7 3770K - 32GB RAM - Pioneer BDR-209D

User avatar
f.r3d
Posts: 75
Joined: 2016-07-28 16:39
Location: France
Has thanked: 4 times

Re: Dysfunctional DVD Drive

#11 Post by f.r3d »

When I insert a music cd /media/cdrom is empty.

Code: Select all

frederic@frederic-laptop:~$ cat /etc/fstab
# /etc/fstab: static file system information.
#
# Use 'blkid' to print the universally unique identifier for a
# device; this may be used with UUID= as a more robust way to name devices
# that works even if disks are added and removed. See fstab(5).
#
# <file system> <mount point>   <type>  <options>       <dump>  <pass>
# / was on /dev/sda5 during installation
UUID=b453ab8b-f85c-424e-bb37-a6011ac26bb7 /               ext4    errors=remount-ro 0       1
# /home was on /dev/sda6 during installation
UUID=c3a9b9ca-4a97-480e-b2c7-7ceb48c9cd11 /home           ext4    defaults        0       2
# swap was on /dev/sda1 during installation
UUID=fc3d7e3f-160d-40a6-990e-24d6ae100fb0 none            swap    sw              0       0
/dev/sr0        /media/cdrom0   udf,iso9660 user,noauto     0       0
tmpfs      /tmp            tmpfs        defaults,size=4g           0    0
tmpfs    /var/cache/apt/archives    tmpfs    defaults,size=4g    0    0
Debian 11 Gnome 64bit
Thinkpad T460
4X Intel Core i7-6600U / 8GB Ram / Intel HD Graphics 520 / 256GB SSD /

User avatar
dasein
Posts: 7680
Joined: 2011-03-04 01:06
Location: Terra Incantationum

Re: Dysfunctional DVD Drive

#12 Post by dasein »

f.r3d wrote:OK so here is what I have tried so far. I booted on a live usb with Fedora and when I inserted a music cd, it didn't show up, nor with a software cd (with a windows software on it for a dictionary).
Which leaves a strong but still rebuttable assumption of hardware failure. The fact that the drive is seen by both BIOS and OS strengthens that presumption.

A couple more things to try before ordering a new drive...

- Install wodim (if necessary) and post the output of

Code: Select all

wodim --devices 
- Put a data disc in the drive and attempt to mount manually (as root)

Code: Select all

mount -t iso9660 /dev/sr0 /media/cdrom && ls -l /media/cdrom

User avatar
f.r3d
Posts: 75
Joined: 2016-07-28 16:39
Location: France
Has thanked: 4 times

Re: Dysfunctional DVD Drive

#13 Post by f.r3d »

Code: Select all

frederic@frederic-laptop:~$ wodim --devices
wodim: No such file or directory. 
Cannot open SCSI driver!
For possible targets try 'wodim --devices' or 'wodim -scanbus'.
For possible transport specifiers try 'wodim dev=help'.
For IDE/ATAPI devices configuration, see the file README.ATAPI.setup from
the wodim documentation.
What kind of data drive ?
Debian 11 Gnome 64bit
Thinkpad T460
4X Intel Core i7-6600U / 8GB Ram / Intel HD Graphics 520 / 256GB SSD /

User avatar
dasein
Posts: 7680
Joined: 2011-03-04 01:06
Location: Terra Incantationum

Re: Dysfunctional DVD Drive

#14 Post by dasein »

f.r3d wrote:What kind of data drive ?
Doesn't matter. That dictionary you used last time is fine.

But I'm definitely not optimistic :(

If the manual mount fails (and at this point, I'm assuming that it will), I am fresh out of ideas. So far, the drive has failed every test put to it, and I'm hard-pressed to think of a way it could be anything but hardware. Many inexpensive optical drive OEMs save on manufacturing costs by using crappy, low-powered lasers.

User avatar
f.r3d
Posts: 75
Joined: 2016-07-28 16:39
Location: France
Has thanked: 4 times

Re: Dysfunctional DVD Drive

#15 Post by f.r3d »

Code: Select all

frederic@frederic-laptop:~$ sudo mount -t iso9660 /dev/sr0 /media/cdrom && ls -l /media/cdrom
[sudo] password for frederic: 
mount: aucun support trouvé dans /dev/sr0
I think it is broken indeed...
Debian 11 Gnome 64bit
Thinkpad T460
4X Intel Core i7-6600U / 8GB Ram / Intel HD Graphics 520 / 256GB SSD /

User avatar
dasein
Posts: 7680
Joined: 2011-03-04 01:06
Location: Terra Incantationum

Re: Dysfunctional DVD Drive

#16 Post by dasein »

f.r3d wrote:

Code: Select all

mount: no media found in  /dev/sr0
(If Google translate is to be believed)
I think it is broken indeed...
Agreed. I mean, until/unless a second drive were to fail, it's still theoretically possible that it's software, but the safe-money bet is dead drive.

If you have a retailer near you that will price-match newegg or amazon (and has a liberal return policy, just in case), remember that buying local supports local jobs (including yours).

User avatar
f.r3d
Posts: 75
Joined: 2016-07-28 16:39
Location: France
Has thanked: 4 times

Re: Dysfunctional DVD Drive

#17 Post by f.r3d »

I'll see about that. I do not really use any CD/DVD nowadays but it could come in very handy soon so I'll check that out.

Thank you for your help !
Debian 11 Gnome 64bit
Thinkpad T460
4X Intel Core i7-6600U / 8GB Ram / Intel HD Graphics 520 / 256GB SSD /

User avatar
dasein
Posts: 7680
Joined: 2011-03-04 01:06
Location: Terra Incantationum

Re: [SOLVED] Dysfunctional DVD Drive

#18 Post by dasein »

Wish the news had been better. Thanks for marking your thread as [SOLVED] :cool:

Post Reply