Docking station problems

[dwaincchm]

I have been having problems with the CD/DVD reader/burner on my docking station - the Vaio is a PCG-R600HMPD. I have gone to the download area for updates but I still cannot seem to get the driver to either read or burn disks when I insert a new CD into the slot. Any recommendations? I have tried to go through Sony technical support but they have not been very insightful into a solution.

[kee-lo_]

Did you update to Windows XP SP2?

[dwaincchm]

Yes I did. Several days ago, but still no luck.

[kee-lo_]

Did the drive work before this?

[dwaincchm]

no it didn't. I tried several times to get assistance from Sony Tech support online but they only recommend superficial solutions to this problem. The problems started after I sent the unit to France for repair, they replaced the harddrive and since them it has not worked correctly.

[Marcos]

I have the same docking station and same series laptop as you, my disc drive has major problems reading or writing recordable media. Pre-written CDs and DVDs play without a problem but CD-Rs or CD-RW in whatever state make the drive click away and not get anywhere. I have given up with my docking station and bought myself an external DVD-RW, which can be had for as little as 80GBP i think.

[dwaincchm]

Thanks for the response, I think I have come to the conclusion that this is the only solution for me as well. Cheers

[kee-lo_]

Try searching google for ASPI drivers.
This might help you out.

[Jacko]

I'm having the same problem with my PCG-R600HFPD's docking station, and I've tried all sorts of things to get it working. It'll read DVDs, but nothing else (not even 'manufactured' CD-ROMs or CD-Audios, let alone CD-Rs I've made myself in the past).

I reckon it's a driver problem of some kind - probably to do with Nero or CloneCD which I installed and removed about 8 months ago. But there is so little USEFUL information out there from SONY to explain exactly WHAT drivers and registry keys are supposed to be there, and the whole thing is complicated further by the fact that the DVD/CD-RW drive is connected via the IEEE 1394 Firewire port into the docking station. For all I know, it's nothing to do with the DVD drive drivers, it could be the 1394bus.sys or sbp2port.sys files (which got patched in a recent XP update).

I haven't yet taken the plunge and installed XP SP2 - still waiting to confirm that I'm not going to lose any functionality in Adobe Photoshop Elements, as I have read tales to that effect. But I have also read that there were some fixes made to sbp2port.sys in XP SP2, so who knows....

Kee-Lo - regarding your ASPI drivers idea. I looked that up, and discovered that (apparently) XP is meant to work WITHOUT ASPI, and it's not recommended to install it. I'm not suggesting you're wrong (quite the opposite - you're probably right) - but can you confirm this is a 'back-trackable step' if it turns out that ASPI is a bad idea for XP? I don't want to make matters worse, if I can help it.

Cheers all

[kee-lo_]

I've never heard ASPI is bad for XP, things like CDRWIN require it and I think even Clone CD does too.