In an effort to make burning a live CD a reality going to give this one more shot. 1. It does not recognize that there is a blank CD inserted 2. It will play both a music CD as well as a data (computer based learning CD) In desperation I went to live chat on HP support and was fortunate enough to get someone who understood English and was not outsourced to India. What follows good bad or indifferent is what he outlined I do and what I did (It still does not recognize blank media. This exchange I am about to relate obviously will only be understood by the really experienced user. I suredo not understand what I did. I do know it helped absolutely nothing I cannot afford a new PC, but would it help to purchase an external device as I do insist on being able to burn live CD or my fun in Linux will come to an end. I reset BIOS, reinstall cd/dvd drivers for checking the issue. All that was really done here was the assurance that yes was highlighted to assure I was back to my default BIOS settings. Went to run typed in devmgmt.msc Right click on CD/DVD drive icon listed under "CD-Rom/DVD-Rom" and select "Un-install".Once the device is un-installed it may prompt you to restart the notebook PC but I recomment not to restart the notebook PC and continue performing the below steps: Start Registry Editor Click Start, click Run, type regedit, and then click OK. Registry Editor starts. Delete the Upper Filters registry entry 1. In Registry Editor, expand My Computer, and then expand HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE. 2. Expand SYSTEM, and then expand Current Control Set. 3. Expand Control, and then expand Class. 4. Under Class, click {4D36E965-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318}. 5. In the right pane (topic area), click Upper Filters. Note An Upper Filters.bak registry entry may also appear. To delete the UpperFilters registry entry, you must click Upper Filters and not Upper Filters.bak. 6. On the Edit menu, click Delete.7. When you receive the following message, click Yes to confirm the deletion of the Upper Filters registry entry: Are you sure you want to delete this value? The Upper Filters registry entry is removed from the {4D36E965-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318} registry subkey. Note Do not exit Registry Editor. You must have this program for the next step. Step 3: Delete the Lower Filters registry entry 1. In Registry Editor, expand My Computer, and then expand HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE. 2. Expand SYSTEM, and then expand Current ControlSet. 3. Expand Control, and then expand Class. 4. Under Class, click {4D36E965-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318}. 5. In the right pane (topic area), click Lower Filters. Note An LowerFilters.bak registry entry may also appear. To delete the LowerFilters registry entry, you must click LowerFilters and not Lower Filters.bak. 6. On the Edit menu, click Delete. 7. When you receive the following message, click Yes to confirm the deletion of the LowerFilters registry entry: Are you sure you want to delete this value? The Lower Filters registry entry is removed from the {4D36E965-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318} registry subkey. 8. Exit Registry Editor. Step 4: Restart the computer -- Allen Meyers <a href="mailto:texas.chef94@gmail.com">texas.chef94@gmail.com</a>