I have a liteon dvdrw when i was running xp (not installed slack yet) it was doin fine... reads cd-r's, data cd's, vcd's, dvd's.... when i installed slackware (on another HD 10gb) kinda got weird because now, it cant read or burn cdr's, data cd's and vcd's... but yes it can read dvd's and can burn dvd's.. when i saw this problem i booted up on xp and saw its the same... this never happened before... why did this happen? im not new to linux but still is a newbie... for the info i never modified anything on slack and or winxp. thanks for the help.. i kinda need this right now... thanks in advance.... (p.s. if you need any system info just request, ill be here waiting for replies... thanks a whole lot...)

Y'know, I just went thru the same runnish with both my CDR/RW and then a month later with my DVD-ROM.

It all started when my CD unit would no longer recognize CD-R discs, but it WOULD recognize CD-RW discs. Shortly after that it wouldn't read either of them in Linux, and in WinXP it wasn't working right either.
Then suddenly, my DVD player would read computer discs, like to install an OS, but it wouldn't play movies at all, it just sat there making noises and flashing its lights.
The solution: Take apart the unit and clean the lens with a Q-tip and alcohol.
This worked miraculously with both my drives, and both work like new again.
NOTE: if your drive is pretty new, this is likely not the issue. Mine are just over 3 yrs old, and had accumulated a film of smoke and crap on the lens. Cleaning disks were useless, it needed a real cleaning with an alcohol swab.

Mines just a few months old and i too cant believe thats its doing what its not supposed to do... anyway thanks a lot.

maybe get the latest firmware upgrade from the manufacturer ... if they have one.

Just a guess, but the type of problem might indicate that some plugs are loose inside your computer... This would explain that you have trouble on both your systems.

Another thing you might want to check is if your devices are mapped to the right device files. Is your DVD drive really mapped to /dev/dvd (or /dev/dvd0 or so)? Check your /etc/fstab for this. But this wouldn't explain that under Windows you have the same trouble.

gargamel

Yeah, it's gotta be something about the drive itself, either firmware or maybe bad connection somewhere or maybe it is faulty. If it were Slackware's fault, why does it also not work in Window$ ? Only explanation is external.