Well, being a n00b and putzin' along w/trying/experimenting to get everything to run right for me using Kubuntu 7.04.

I'm dual booting with Win XP. Each OS has it's own HD. When using XP, WMP plays the CD fine. When I'm operating under Kubuntu, I've tried Amarok and KsCD but both tend to kick out the CD after one or two songs for no apparent (to me) reason. I've got the DVD-ROM to play DVDs fine with Totem and some plugins so... could somebody help me figure out what I need to download or where I'm screwing up.

Oh, computer is an 8yr old HP P3, don't know if that matters.

Thanks in advance for any advice.

SD

It is possible that WMP uses a certain amount of error correction to compensate for a dodgy laser lens and the Linux apps don't have as good or any error correction. Have you ran a CD/DVD cleaner lately on the drive?.

Nope, never has been cleaned (didn't know I really needed to).

The CDRW has never really been used much. Burning a dozen distros in the last month is probably the most work it's ever had and all Live CDs ran fine as far as I could tell. My kids PS2 has a million times more hours on it than this computer's CD reader and I've never ran a cleaner through that either.

But, maybe it's time!

Where can I get one? Are some brands better than others or are they all generically the same?

Is there any type of test disc that can be run through on the drive to check it out?

SD

Don't know about test CD's, but CD/DVD cleaners can be found anywhere you can by computers/accessories like Radio Shack®. But it don't matter how many times they are used, dust collects on the lens, and if it's barely used, the dust can be thicker and burns to a film instead of burning off completely. Most car audio units have extensive error correction due to vibrations, computer applications may or may not have error correction capabilities, but usually no where near as good as car audio.
This may not be the cause of your problem, just one possibility.

or it could all be a lot more simple : i used to have the same problem - that is when i inserted the audio cd it would not produce any sound (though helix player was showing me that the disk was playing) - so what i did was configure the linux sound system (through gnome's sound manager) to raise the output volume (which was by default cero x). After that it worked perfectly - could be another shot ...

I don't know if this will help or not...

I just put the audio CD in the DVD-ROM drive and it played the whole CD fine using KsCD.

I know, just play audio CDs in that drive, right?

I'll pick up a cleaner and see if that helps the CD drive.

SD