Resolved Hardware problem?

The CD/DVD RW drive in my HP cpu w/Vista Home won't read a known good CD burned on another cpu. It tells me to insert a disc. Also, also my card reader won't open a Compact Flash card w/pics on it. It teels me to reformat before use. What's happening? Are both problems related? Thanks

 

Probably not. Does the HP DVD drive read other disks fine? Unfortunately, disks burned on one player often are not readable on another player. I personally think it has to do with how the heads are aligned - perhaps the heads on drive 1 are slightly out of alignment in one direction, and the heads on drive 2 are slightly out the other direction. Factory pressed disks - which tend to have precise alignment are read fine. And the slightly out of alignment disks burned by one drive are read fine by the same drive, as the alignment is out the same way. But a 2nd drive is not able to compensate.

If other disks work fine, then one or both of the drives may have some alignment issues - and that generally means new drives - hopefully ones that have precise alignments - that have not been bounced around during shipping.

As for your reader - does the camera open the images fine?

 

Thanks for the reply. A friend burned some pictures on a disc using his cpu that wouldn't play on mine, but played OK on his. Other discs play just fine on mine. He then sent the pics to me on a compact flash card. Again, loaded on his cpu. It sounds like he has the issue? Thanks

 

And your flash card reader works with other cards fine?

And do you have a suitable program associated with those image file types? Can you view other files that have the same filename extension?

 

Thanks again. The card reader reads the sd cards from my camera just fine. I'm trying to find out what file format is on the cf card. I'm using, or trying to use, whatever software is included with Vista. I might need something else?

 

Yes. Or at least you may have to "associate" that file type to a program you already have.

 

Thanks again. So I guess I have to wait until I know what file format is on the card before I can continue?

 

I am trying to get the gist of the situation here.
As Bill points out your file extension is important, if you are using different software than your friend does.
The most common extension is .jpeg, if your friend for instance uses Adobe Photoshop and sends the pics to you in the photoshop extension instead of jpeg and you do not have Adobe Photoshop installed on your PC you could well have problems opening them. There are many other extensions around but the jpeg is most acceptable.
Another issue could be with your card-reader there are now 2 different forms of SD cards the normal SD and SD HC and HC cards will not read in a standard SD reader, SDHC though is backward compatible.

hawk22

 

I'm still waiting to find out what file format he used, as well as the program he used. I'm having trouble with a compact flash card, not an sd card. The sd cards from my camera open just fine. Thanks for the reply.

 

Which suggests the reader is fine. So either that flash card has problems, or the data on it is not in a format you can read.

 

That's what I was thinking all along. Thanks to who responded for all of the help.

 

This is resolved. I'm guessing there is a problem with the card or the disc as everything else seems to work OK in my cpu. The pics were jpegs, so there should have been no problem in reading them. Thanks