Strange CDROM Problem

Hi All,
I have a wierd one here. The machine is a Gateway MT6919 laptop, I can provide more detailed specs of the machine if necessary, but I don't think it's relevent to the problem. I've attached a screen shot of the system properties, everything with windows is up to date.

The issue is with the CDROM Drive. When you insert a software CD that is "Compatible with both PC and Mac", it reads the Mac files before the PC files and will not read the PC files. When you insert the CD, the CDROM icon changes to one with a little red apple in the bottom left corner of it and all of the files appear to be Mac OSX related. I can take the CDROM to another laptop of mine (HP dv1240us) and it reads the PC portion of the CD just fine (shows a completely different set of files that work proper in Windows). I've attached a screen shot of the icon when the CD is inserted. The drive description in Devmgmt.msc is HL-DT-ST DVDRAM GSA-T20N ATA Device.

Anyway, I've Googled extensively on this and can't find a solution. I'm hopeing it's one of those "it's so simple, it's never discussed anymore" solutions. Any assistance would be greatly appreciated. One last thing, I think this has been an ongoing problem for a long time, ever since my wife started school, she has run across a lot of test/assistance CDs from the college that do this. I assumed at the time they were junk CDs, but now I'm thinking the computer was reading the MAC side of things all along.

Thanks in advance for any help,
Robert

have you tried changing your autoplay default action?

To me that sounds funky. Did you just try exploring the drive and work from there? It could just be the computer on how it wants to read it. I am stumpted...that could be why you couldnt find it on google..lol

I actually don't set any autoplay defaults, I like the popup to ask me what to do with CDs and Media Cards, etc.

I can not play around on the CDROM while it's in the gateway laptop, if you try to left click or right click, it does nothing. But when the CD is in my HP laptop, the files are different, and I can mess around with it just like any normal CDROM. I've attached screenshots of the same CD in my two different laptops. The one titled 'Gateway' is what it shows on the Mac side of the disc in my Gateway laptop. The one titled 'HP' is what the CD shows in my HP laptop on the Windows side of the disc.

I know it's a strange one, I am 99% positive that Windows can not read Mac file structures and/or files without special software and since I have no desire to read Mac files, I've never downloaded and/or purchased such software, so this is really strange to me. I was hoping that someone has seen the little red apple in the CDROM icon before and knows how to make the CDROM read the PC files.

Anyway, thanks for the replies, and please keep them coming.

Thank you,
Robert

p.s. - My HP laptop is running Windows7 64bit Home Premium.

rjorr said:

I actually don't set any autoplay defaults, I like the popup to ask me what to do with CDs and Media Cards, etc.

I can not play around on the CDROM while it's in the gateway laptop, if you try to left click or right click, it does nothing. But when the CD is in my HP laptop, the files are different, and I can mess around with it just like any normal CDROM. I've attached screenshots of the same CD in my two different laptops. The one titled 'Gateway' is what it shows on the Mac side of the disc in my Gateway laptop. The one titled 'HP' is what the CD shows in my HP laptop on the Windows side of the disc.

I know it's a strange one, I am 99% positive that Windows can not read Mac file structures and/or files without special software and since I have no desire to read Mac files, I've never downloaded and/or purchased such software, so this is really strange to me. I was hoping that someone has seen the little red apple in the CDROM icon before and knows how to make the CDROM read the PC files.

Anyway, thanks for the replies, and please keep them coming.

Thank you,
Robert

p.s. - My HP laptop is running Windows7 64bit Home Premium.

Click to expand...

first of all, try uac turned off.
if that doesn't work, some apple program on your computer (e.g. iTunes, Quicktime, Spotify etc) might be conflicting with the Windows side of things. if you have any of these programs or apple related-software, try uninstalling them and then put in the cd.
Hope this hopes,

Dom