Need some desperate PC help (also, why I hate PCs)

Look, normally I wouldn't do this, but I'm straight up running out of options. I've been skimming through a crap ton of forums, and not much has worked, so I'm turning to you guys to see if you can help me figure this out. So, I downloaded the trial of Corel VideoStudio Pro X5, and was trying to mess around with it. I put in a disc, pulled some of the footage off of it, messed a little with editing it, and then tried to burn it through the program. Things seemed to be going fine until The end of the burn process, where I got an "unspecified error", after which my disc kicked to Windows Media Player and started to play. I popped it out, tried it in a DVD Player, and no success.

"Okay, no big deal, will just try to burn it with different settings," I thought. Well, so much for that. As I put in another disc, I noticed my auto run didn't detect it. Getting a bad feeling, I checked My Computer and noticed that it now can't see my stupid disk drive. No CDs/DVDs are recognized in it, and it's become totally useless in a matter of a second. However, it still pops up in Device Manager and says that it's working fine(which is a filthy lie). I've tried doing a regedit as some places suggested, I tried uninstalling it and grabbing the drivers again, I tried disabling the integrity check, and all didn't do a thing. So I ask you guys, is there anything that you can think of? Has anyone had the same problem and fixed it, be it with Corel or another program? Also, assuming I do fix it, how can I prevent it from happening in the future, if I wanted to use something like Corel again?

Seriously though, this is why I can stand computers. Nothing friggin' works. I'm tired of every single program being a crap shoot whether it will even function or not. Heck, now I don't even know if a random program will destroy my computer, just 'cause. It's exhausting. For once, I wish something would just work like it's supposed to, without costing me hours of troubleshooting and trying to fix a temporarily broken machine. Gah, sorry for the rant. It's just that this type of crap happens way too often, and it's getting to me.

Have you tried inserting a different disc drive?

I had a very odd rig a few years back. After a few days it would stop reading discs. But I had a seperate drive laying about. Swapped that in and everything worked. But later that drive as well failed to read discs. Popped back in the original drive once more and suddently it worked! For a few days... And thus began a crazy drive swapping odyssey. Both only working for a brief period of time, and only when being completely removed from system.

@NicksCorner: Yikes, that sounds terrible. But no, I haven't tried that. Don't have a spare one sitting around, and don't want to buy a new one until I'm completely out of options. Besides, from what I've read, it's a computer thing, not a drive thing. Something about an interference with burning software, possibly. Not sure if I will have to uninstall the program or not. Of course, if that did magically, work then that would beg the question of how I keep my computer stable and still use the program. Cause surely there has to be a way to make the dumb thing work.

@Quarters: Check your firewall settings, maybe set the burning program as a protected or trusted application?

@c0l0nelp0c0rn1: Nope. Tried finding it, but it wasn't even on the list to click on. Therefore, don't think that was the problem. Anyway, as an update, tried system restore. It didn't work. Not sure what my next step is.

My guess is either faulty disc and/or faulty DVD burner. Have you tried reburning onto another disc? I'm not familiar with that Corel program, but does the trial version let you save jobs you worked on?

@Quarters said:

Look, normally I wouldn't do this, but I'm straight up running out of options. I've been skimming through a crap ton of forums, and not much has worked, so I'm turning to you guys to see if you can help me figure this out. So, I downloaded the trial of Corel VideoStudio Pro X5, and was trying to mess around with it. I put in a disc, pulled some of the footage off of it, messed a little with editing it, and then tried to burn it through the program. Things seemed to be going fine until The end of the burn process, where I got an "unspecified error", after which my disc kicked to Windows Media Player and started to play. I popped it out, tried it in a DVD Player, and no success.

"Okay, no big deal, will just try to burn it with different settings," I thought. Well, so much for that. As I put in another disc, I noticed my auto run didn't detect it. Getting a bad feeling, I checked My Computer and noticed that it now can't see my stupid disk drive. No CDs/DVDs are recognized in it, and it's become totally useless in a matter of a second. However, it still pops up in Device Manager and says that it's working fine(which is a filthy gypsy lie). I've tried doing a regedit as some places suggested, I tried uninstalling it and grabbing the drivers again, I tried disabling the integrity check, and all didn't do a thing. So I ask you guys, is there anything that you can think of? Has anyone had the same problem and fixed it, be it with Corel or another program? Also, assuming I do fix it, how can I prevent it from happening in the future, if I wanted to use something like Corel again?

Seriously though, this is why I can stand computers. Nothing friggin' works. I'm tired of every single program being a crap shoot whether it will even function or not. Heck, now I don't even know if a random program will destroy my computer, just 'cause. It's exhausting. For once, I wish something would just work like it's supposed to, without costing me hours of troubleshooting and trying to fix a temporarily broken machine. Gah, sorry for the rant. It's just that this type of crap happens way too often, and it's getting to me.

On of the more common reasons your DVD drive isn't being recognised because you're likely using Daemon Tools and the antipiracy software in Video Studio (or a number of other things) has scrubbed access to your drive. You'll need to A. stop pirating apps from nefarious sources B. remove Daemon Tools and C. Reflash your DVD drive (and possibly D. Reinstall Windows).

This isn't meant as some sort of character assasination either. It's just a common anti piracy feature of certain Burning and Video editing software which strongly depend on the DVD/CD ROM.

@Lunar_Aura No disc register in my drive now, and I'm not even talking about the program. Can't even load a game or music.

@SeriouslyNow Not using Daemon Tools. Don't even have it on my computer. Not a pirate. Again, like I said in the OP, I downloaded the official 30 day trial from their website. That's all. However, what's this reflash thing you're talking about? Not super knowledgeable about all areas of computers, so I don't know what that process entails. And unfortunately, not even sure how I could reinstall Windows if I wanted to. See, I bought my computer premade from a local computer store, and they never gave me a Windows 7 disc or anything to go along with it. Ugh. Hope that doesn't mean I have to deal with trying to work with them.

Also, it sounds like this is an issue with Window 7 in general from some of the things I've read.

Use a USB. Also, why do you need to burn demo software?

You sure the trial just doesn't let you burn stuff to a disc?

Racial slurs make me sad.

@AlexW00d@deathstriker666 Huh? I was trying burn stuff with the trial. That's my point. First, it allows you to edit footage you upload, such as stuff recorded with a camcorder, and then, you can burn said edited footage to a DVD. Stuff like home movies and things like that. After I tried to (unsuccessfully) burn a disc through VideoStudio, my drive vanished. I wasn't trying to burn software. And use a USB what? A USB disk drive? Do those exist?

@nivi I agree.

@Quarters: That's what I am saying. Does the trial actually let you burn stuff to disc? I know a lot of trials just don't let you do stuff.

@Quarters: I was objecting to your racial slur.

@Quarters: Daemon tools isn't for pirates, it's for a time when discs were required to be in the drive to play games, or suggested because space was more limited. It's also cool for keeping DVDs on your system without going through all of the bullshit that is ripping. Ripping is a pain in the ass, don't blame PCs for that. It's not supposed to really be easy, and if you are using a bit of trial software like it sounds like you are, it's probably not going to do the trick for you.

PCs are fine, and if you have so much trouble, you have a piece of shit rig or you don't have the basic education on how to use a computer you should have when, ya know, using a computer. Plenty of people use PCs with easy and without them constantly breaking, so chances are if there's a reason, it's either your PC being a premade piece of crap, or because you're not taking care of it.

Now for helping: If you're thinking it's an issue with windows 7, try setting the program to run as Administrator. There's a way to make everything run that way, you might wanna look that up. I'm not gunna tell you how to do it because it's easy to just google how to run as administrator.

Another suggestion, restart your computer, try burning something to a disc through the OS or a basic software like iTunes/Windows Media Player. Test if it's possible, and if it is, it's probably your software. Use better software. Don't go for the free trials, don't go for the little guys, find out what works, buy it, and use it.

"Also report on whether or not the burning module still gives unspecified error when the music track/motion menu items aren't checked."

Googled your problem, this was a bit from the very first thing that was posted and that was posted a couple days ago. Check that out.

@AlexW00d Yeah, it lets you burn stuff. The trial gives you access to all the features.

@nivi Crap, took me a second to figure out what you were talking about. I'm sorry. Didn't even think of it as a slur. Wasn't trying to make it sound like one. Not racist, and wasn't even thinking about it when I said. More just thinking about how mad I was at my computer. However, I cam across as a douche and I apologize, because it was never my intention. Removed the offending word. Seriously, dude, sorry.

@MordeaniisChaos The problem is, it isn't just the program. Nothing can find the drive. I've had to run a bunch of other stuff in administrator(games and such), so I wouldn't mind trying that to see if it would fix the fact that it didn't burn properly, but I still need the drive to work first. And yeah, I can burn stuff fine through CD Burner XP and iTunes or whatever, and I realize that the program has some issues. The forums for it state that themselves. However, trying to get it to work for other reasons, since I can make a good menu and can also edit through it.

Also, it's not a free, little guy software or anything. Corel VideoStudio X5 costs 80 bucks, and is fairly heavy duty. The trial is just a free 30 days, fully functional. Got it to make sure it would work right. Mainly to avoid situations like this. If it worked well, I was going to pick it up permanently. If I can get my drive working right, might still do that, because it does have some great features.

And yeah, I saw that too. Was actually the first thing I was going to try when I burnt my next disc, but my drive went offline before I could. Like I said, the drive is what I'm concerned about, not the program. I'm sure I'll get that working one way or another.

And I will not debate the possibility of my computer being a premade piece of crap. My local computer stores kind of suck, and while it has some nice stuff in it, the lady who built it clearly wasn't the most knowledgeable person in the world, especially for something like gaming. Also, it's a couple of years old. Not everything is busted on it, it's just the general feeling of at least one thing has to go wrong every time I install something. Most of the time, I can fix it through Google and trial and error. This is going a bit rougher than normal.

So you're not trying to burn the software? Only trying to export a few files? Right, so where did you save your files? What folder? Usually the default option is somewhere in your Corel directory under C:/program files. Find them and drag them into your disc drive. Here's the user manual. Jump to page 135

It seems pretty obvious that nobody here is going to be able to fix your problem...from the looks of it, half the people responding don't even understand what the problem is that you're asking about. Sorry :/

@Slab64: *shrug* It was worth a shot, at least. Don't worry about it.

PS, if you want to really get this stuff taken care of, try either Tested's forums, or go to the forums for the software. Giantbomb is not the place to go for advice on this kinda stuff, you'll usually get incorrect advice or people who have no idea how to help you.

Heh, I actually had he exact same thing happened to me a few months ago. I was burning some web design tutorials and wanted to burn them to DVD, something happened mid-burn and the write failed. I tried to just to burn it again but kept getting an error stating that there was no blank disc in my drive, but there totally was.

After going through about 5 blank discs, I realised I no longer had a disc drive in my computer - wasn't showing up. Nothing I put in there was being read. Did some reading and it apparently does happen to people on Win7.

I ended up fixing it by doing two things but I can't remember what.... one was download and install an official Microsoft tool that fixed it, if you Google something like download Microsoft CD drive fix it might come up. If that doesn't work, go to Device Manager, select your disc drive and uninstall and reinstall the drivers.

EDIT: This was it: http://support.microsoft.com/mats/cd_dvd_drive_problems/en-us

Have you used a paper clip in the hole to eject your bad disc and then re-boot the computer and try again?

I'm unfamiliar with this software, but I have had the situation where my computer "lost" my disk drive. Unfortunately, fixing it involved editing/deleting registry files, which I'm not knowledgeable enough to comfortably recommend. Still, something to consider.

@Zero_: Funny thing.I was having a different issue with mine,couldn't get drivers to reinstall right without having issues,and that fixed it.Thanks for the link!

Any rate,I'd say first thing to do is make sure drivers are updated,and if not,do so.If they are,but the drive's not reading,try uninstalling then reinstalling.As written above it's not a catchall,but it'd be an OK place to start.

Yeah, some of this is what's making me think the drive might be going bad. I've tried that Microsoft Fix posted earlier(may have been the first thing I tried), and a lot of people have claimed that it helped them out. However, it didn't do anything for me. I also tried the registry thing, and also the uninstall/reinstall. All seem to have helped people quite a bit, but for some reason none of them work for me. If I can get my hands on another drive, I'd try putting it in and see if that fixes it. Seems strange that none of these fixes have worked. One of the big differences I've noticed between my scenario and others is that my Device Manager says that the thing is working fine, whereas most say that the Device Manager will tell them that something is wrong. That seems fishy.

Our boss's machine did almost the exact same thing a month ago. Testing this stuff is going to be dependent on what you have access to.

After what you've tried to do I would see if you can install that drive in another computer to see whether or not there's a problem with the actual physical drive. If the drive shows up working in another system you know you have a software/driver type of problem. If it doesn't show up you have an actual drive problem which is either a physical failure or a problem where the drive firmware needs to be flashed. If you don't know how to do this it's not hard but if you don't want to bother I should point out that cd/dvd rom drives are dirt cheap on places like newegg.com. If it's an older or out of warranty drive this might be your best bet.

To be perfectly honest I have a feeling you're having a driver conflict of some sort. What can happen is that there are multiple drivers or shared files installed for the same drive which don't agree with each other. When we ran into this problem we didn't realize it at first and had tried a lot of the same things you've tried. Our senior network tech realized after a little research that there were three registry values he had to delete prior to reinstalling the drive. Worth a try although as always be careful when editing the registry.

I don't know if this final option is workable for you or not but you might want to do a system restore. Start > accessories > system tools > system restore. Now this is dependent on you having a restore point that was created prior to the software install. Sometimes this can fix these issues but not always.

Good luck.

@Maluvin Thanks for the help. I don't really have access to another computer to try putting the drive into(though it's a good idea). I have tried a system restore already, and it didn't really do anything. The next thing I'm trying is that I'm going to uninstall iTunes/Corel VideoStudio, and see if that corrects things somehow. If it works, I'll reinstall iTunes, and maybe Corel. See if I can get it working again this time. And I don't mind attempting to flash the drive, I just don't know how to. Might try looking it up or something. And I did edit my registry. Something about Upper Filters and Lower Filters? Took out the Upper(didn't have any Lower), but it still didn't work. Thankfully, as you said, if I want a new drive, they're pretty cheap. If I just wanted to get one like I have, I can get it for less than $20 on Amazon. Haven't checked newegg yet.

@Quarters said:

@Maluvin Thanks for the help. I don't really have access to another computer to try putting the drive into(though it's a good idea). I have tried a system restore already, and it didn't really do anything. The next thing I'm trying is that I'm going to uninstall iTunes/Corel VideoStudio, and see if that corrects things somehow. If it works, I'll reinstall iTunes, and maybe Corel. See if I can get it working again this time. And I don't mind attempting to flash the drive, I just don't know how to. Might try looking it up or something. And I did edit my registry. Something about Upper Filters and Lower Filters? Took out the Upper(didn't have any Lower), but it still didn't work. Thankfully, as you said, if I want a new drive, they're pretty cheap. If I just wanted to get one like I have, I can get it for less than $20 on Amazon. Haven't checked newegg yet.

Doh, well sounds like you're out of options given what you have at hand. Only other thing I can think of trying aside from what you've mentioned is rebooting with your Win7 disk and doing an OS repair from there.

Just out of curiosity have you tried rebooting and going into the BIOS to see if the drive shows up there? If it doesn't show up there that would make me lean more towards thinking the hardware failed.

@Maluvin: Don't have the boot disk, as it was premade at a computer store, so that's not an option.

However, haven't tried the BIOS. Will do that sometime tonight. Thanks for the tip.

I know your going to hate me for saying this but check to make sure none of the cables became lose. I have no idea how but the ATA cable came lose on my disk drive somehow.... Also hardfourm is really great for PC help. Keep GB for the game reviews and the lulz.

@BigChickenDinner: Hmmm...wonder if that's a possibility. Unfortunately, don't have the tools nor the know-how to check that. Might try to get a friend to help.

@Quarters said:

@BigChickenDinner: Hmmm...wonder if that's a possibility. Unfortunately, don't have the tools nor the know-how to check that. Might try to get a friend to help.

The idea to open the case up and check the cables is a really good one. Happened to me when made my PC, it was all running smoothly except for the disk drive, couldnt figure it out until in frustration I opened the case up and it turned out that one of the cables was in but just not quite enough. Depends what sort of case you have but it is crazy easy to do. Just get the case open (most you will have to do it remove a few screws that are holding it together) then look for your disk drive and check that the two or three cables are plugged in correctly at the back of it. The case is made to be opened so you can't damage anything just by having a look.

It's very likely your DVD drive is just a piece of crap or is failing/has failed (same thing has happened to me a couple of times on older PCs with crappy CD/DVD drives). I have noticed the quality of generic optical drives in recent years has degraded rapidly... the build quality just isn't what it used to be for the types of basic drives you get in pre-fab PCs anymore. If this is your problem, then all you can do is replace it. The good news is they are cheap. Just open up the PC to make sure you know what type of connector it uses before buying a replacement. Additionally, one last thing you can try is checking the cable connection while you have the PC open. Sometimes this sort of thing can be the fault of just a bad cable or a loose connection. Try unplugging both ends and firmly reattaching, reboot and test the drive again. Good luck.

@BigChickenDinner: That totally did it. Popped it open, and everything seemed fine, but I went ahead and pushed all the cables, just in case. Booted it back up, and it found the drive no problem. Must've just gotten jostled at some point. So, problem solved. Thanks for the help, duders!

@Quarters: Wow sweet!! I'm so glad it worked for you! It's always hard to tell people to check shit like that because a lot of times they feel like they are being treated like idiots. It really does happen though, when it happened to me I was mid installation on a game, It asked me to switch to disk 2, and suddenly my drive wasn't working. Then I realized it wasn't being seen at all. I check the cable and it had come completely undone.... Fucking bizarre.