[swoosieque]

My OS is WinXP, homemade computer - Intel Pentium 4, 2.5GHz, 2GB Ram, Super Micro motherboard P4SDA...

I have a Plextor 716a (few yrs old) but recently (I don't know when or why or how this happened) it will not read or recognize movie DVDs that I've bought. It will recognize & play commercial music CDs, backed-up (burned) music CDs & backed up DVD movies and data CDs & DVDs, but won't read/play out-of-the-package-copyrighted DVD movies! The drive, in the 'my computer' window doesn't even show that there's a disc present when I put a movie DVD in there.

I've exhaustively tried so many, many, many solutions I can't remember everything I've tried, but here's some:

updated the drive's firmware
uninstalled & reinstalled the drive and its IDE
installed new codecs
installed new DVD decoders, including purchasing the Roxio cineplayer
have Roxio DVDMax Player 2
nothing is helping!!!!

I thought I might have to buy another DVD burner, but, I was assured by Geek Squad (phone call) that it's a software issue based upon my symptoms. He said something about the upper & lower filters.

PLEASE! Can someone help me???

[Jim_Hardin]

Do you have a diagnostic for the drive? Check on their site.

I suspect that the laser for DVD has gone south… Sadly Plextor stopped making drives years ago and went to slapping their name on the lowest bidder… They used to be The Bar now they are to be avoided.

The 'filters' effect Writing, not reading.

[firenhancer]

Go to Start --> Run --> Type "dvdupgrd /detect" --> OK and confirm if system detects any DVD decoder.

[swoosieque]

Go to Start --> Run --> Type "dvdupgrd /detect" --> OK and confirm if system detects any DVD decoder.

Ok, did what you said and this is what came up:


Dshow SW:
Name:"mpgdec.ax"
Company Name:"Moonlight Cordless Ltd."
Version: 2.0.0.2525
Product Version: 2.0.0.2525
CRC32: Oxcad2050e
VID:0
W2k Upgrade=no
Win9xUpgrade=no
LCID=0409

Does this tell you anything?

Do you have a diagnostic for the drive? Check on their site.

I suspect that the laser for DVD has gone south… Sadly Plextor stopped making drives years ago and went to slapping their name on the lowest bidder… They used to be The Bar now they are to be avoided.

The 'filters' effect Writing, not reading.

Oh man, that's what I was dreading and trying to do anything possible to make that not the case. I agree, Plextor was great, didn't know until reading here that they've lost their good reputation.

What's taking Plextor's place insofar as a quality dvd burner?

[firenhancer]

Ok, did what you said and this is what came up:

Dshow SW:
Name:"mpgdec.ax"
Company Name:"Moonlight Cordless Ltd."
Version: 2.0.0.2525
Product Version: 2.0.0.2525
CRC32: Oxcad2050e
VID:0
W2k Upgrade=no
Win9xUpgrade=no
LCID=0409

Does this tell you anything?

1. The decoder that appears to be set default belongs to Elecard from Moonlight Cordless ltd. It is quite possible you either have corrupted or decoder conflicts.
2. Are you able to play any home made video DVDs?

[swoosieque]

1. The decoder that appears to be set default belongs to Elecard from Moonlight Cordless ltd. It is quite possible you either have corrupted or decoder conflicts.
2. Are you able to play any home made video DVDs?

Yes, can play backed-up DVD movies, & burned home movie DVDs.

An update here:

Ran Plextor tools (it wasn't working earlier) was in a screen that had choices to checkmark and one was for "change book type" or something like that, so I checkmarked it, hit apply and suddenly the movie started playing. I dunno if this is a fluke or a real fix. I'm gonna do a hard re-boot and try another movie and see if it's still ok.

OH - how do I change the default decoder? Is that just by changing the file extension default programs in the folders options?

Going to shut down now, will be back.

[firenhancer]

Yes, can play backed-up DVD movies, & burned home movie DVDs.

An update here:

Ran Plextor tools (it wasn't working earlier) was in a screen that had choices to checkmark and one was for "change book type" or something like that, so I checkmarked it, hit apply and suddenly the movie started playing. I dunno if this is a fluke or a real fix. I'm gonna do a hard re-boot and try another movie and see if it's still ok.

OH - how do I change the default decoder? Is that just by changing the file extension default programs in the folders options?

Going to shut down now, will be back.

This is good to know that you are able to play the movie. Hope this is still true after the reboot. As long as you are able to play the DVDs, a change in default decoder may not be necessary. However, if you intend to change your preferred decoder, you can try Windows XP Video Decoder Checkup Utility

This post has been edited by firenhancer: 29 September 2009 - 12:37 PM

[swoosieque]

This is good to know that you are able to play the movie. Hope this is still true after the reboot. As long as you are able to play the DVDs, a change in default decoder may not be necessary. However, if you intend to change your preferred decoder, you can try Windows XP Video Decoder Checkup Utility

Bummer, it's back to not recognizing the same disc I used before.

Oh, and somewhere, I had read that VCL is a really good, pretty much trouble-free dvd decoder/player and that's the one that worked when the disc played in my previous post.

I think I did download the WinXP video decoder checkup and it had a list of incompatible codecs in there (this was yesterday). Anyway, I'll run that again, but how/what do I do with those incompatible codecs? How do I get rid of them?

[jmhoraze]

Bummer, it's back to not recognizing the same disc I used before.
...
I think I did download the WinXP video decoder checkup and it had a list of incompatible codecs in there (this was yesterday). Anyway, I'll run that again, but how/what do I do with those incompatible codecs? How do I get rid of them?

the codec has a filename; search for it, remove it.

[Jim_Hardin]

the codec has a filename; search for it, remove it.

Look at the dates???

OP hasn't been here in 2 1/2+ months... Not likely he will see you post. More likely he has resolved his problem long ago.