DVD-ROM/CD-RW combo drive failure

I read through a couple of the posts on here hoping this question had been asked before. Kind of, but not really. I'm running Windows XP Pro on a laptop with a Toshiba SD-R2412 combo drive. About a month ago I was prompted while using MS Word that I needed a plug-in that I hadn't installed yet. After popping in the cd and waiting for apx. 15 minutes, nothing happened and I gave up on installing the plug-in. Needless to say, since then the drive has failed to read any type of media, be it DVD, CD, blank CDR, burned CDR, etc. I didn't install any new patches for windows or the like, and right before this all happened had just burned two cds and watched a dvd. I've talked with the company who sold me this laptop (small company that sells for Sager Midern) and since I lost my warranty card when moving to college, I would have some difficulty in getting a new combo drive sent to me ("6-8 weeks" through red tape and whatnot, two weeks after my inquiry they still haven't found my invoice number). I was hoping that someone on here might have an answer; I tried a few of the remedies suggested (patches and whatnot) but to no avail. Thanks.

Does the system boot to your Recovery CD? If so, and if it'll read files from that CD then there's a software issue with the system. If not, check the BIOS to see whether or not the drive is listed (having a BIOS option to detect IDE devices would be nice, but a lot of laptops don't have that). If the drive is listed in BIOS but won't boot to a CD then you've got a bad drive on your hands. Or in your lap, depending on the situation.

Ok, I changed a few settings (ie boot order, autoplay), and that appears to be working somewhat. My computer will now acknowledge that there is media in the drive as long as AutoPlay is on (whether or not it's just being forced to read it, I dunno). However, it seems that the drive is continually trying to boot the DVD. As in, it keeps making the initially "clicking" and "whirring" sounds it makes when you first put the media in. Also, when I try to play the media, it will get a few frames in, stop, try to read again, and repeat. At this point, I think either the motor or the reader is completely busted. Any suggestions?

What dvd software are you using?
What does device manager say about the cdrom?

The software I've tried includes WinDVD, Windows Media Player 9, Creative Media Studio, Winamp, and Interactual DVD Player. The drive shows up in device manager, which says it's working properly.

Is it still in warranty?

It is still under warranty for another two months or so, but as I explained in my original post, my inquiry with the company several weeks ago RE: a replacement drive has been somewhat lost in the shuffle. I've looked around and made decide to just buy an external USB drive upgraded to a DVD-RW at this rate.

So I went ahead and bought a TDK dvd+rw combo drive over the weekend and rushed home to install it. Well...that's not working out too well. It plays DVDs, games, and burns DVDs just fine, but still the same problem with CDs, CDRs, and any other media (such as installation discs). I updated my aspi layer as has been suggested in a few other threads, but there are no firmware or bios updates from my manufacturer available. One interesting thing, though. For the media that it won't play, it kind of half loads the cd, and then something rejects it (by this, I mean I can load whatever is on there for maybe a second or two sometimes, then it disappears and gives me that crap about not being formatted or not detecting any media at all.) Unless there are any other suggestions, I'm just going to LAN my hard drive to my desktop, upload everything I want to keep onto there (since I don't feel like wasting the two DVD+Rs I have), and re-format my laptop.

Fair enough. Have you returned your other cd/dvd ?

No, I haven't. I figure since I upgraded there's no reason for me to waste money on shipping to get a drive I won't use.