DVD drive only showing as CD drive

[Spank]

Don't have much details as it's not my computer.

A friend has an Asus laptop with Win 7 Ultimate (up to date) which until a few days ago was happy playing DVD's through medial player.

Now the icon says it's a CD drive and will not play DVD's

I ran this http://support.microsoft.com/mats/cd_dvd_drive_problems

& it seemed to repair it, but nothings changed.

It will open the disk & display it's contents & it will play CD's

Does it need replacing? or is their something that can be fixing

[Scainer]

I had an issue with my drive but I can't remember if it was similar or not, other than it struggled with DVDs.
To fix it I just uninstalled it from device manager and then restarted the computer, when it detected it again it all worked.

[SUMMONER]

Can you see the files/folders on the DVD you have inserted or does it just freeze/eject the disc when you click on the drive name in the "computer" window?

[Spank]

Scainer - I'll tell to uninstall & reboot see if that helps.

Summoner - Yes I could open it up & look at the files.

[SUMMONER]

2 choices, install K-Lite or install VLC. VLC comes highly recommended.

K-Lite will act as a plug-in for Windows Media Player and hopefully re-enable the DVD playback capabilties.

VLC is a stand alone playback software that can pretty much playback any video/audio format known to (wo)man.

[Onkston]

I'd avoid k-lite. Codec packs aren't good I don't think, I have had issues with them myself before. Definitely give vlc a try though, it is excellent.

[emalemon]

Perhaps flashing the firmware will fix the issue? Go onto the manufacturers website and see if there's anything to fix it there, apologies if I'm totally on the wrong tracks here!