Support Information:
Device Type: CD / DVD
Manufacturer: Sony Electronics
Model: AW-G170A
Interface: IDE
Operating System: Windows XP Professional
Age of Device: < 2 years old
FCCID:

Type of drive: dvd-r/cd-rw (dvd burner, dvd reader, &amp; cd burner combo)
Location: internal
What recording software are you using?: Nero/version

Find it on DriverGuide (http://members.driverguide.com/index.php?action=srch&sm=b&aax=&qa6=965&qa5=3&qa7=1500&dp=2&qm0=AW-G170A&jmd=and&fzz=d) | Find it with Google (http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=Sony+Electronics+CD+%2F+DVD++AW-G170A+Windows+XP+Professional+) | Research manufacturer Sony Electronics (http://members.driverguide.com/index.php?action=getinfo&companyid=965)

Optical drives never require a driver when used in any Windows os from Win95 up. Windows XP provides native support that allows this drive to read a data or music disk and to burn a cd-r disk. No support for playing dvd disks or for burning dvd or cd-rw disks. For those tasks, compatible 3rd. party recording & dvd decoding software is required.

If your problem is non-detection, please read post #24 in this thread: http://forums.driverguide.com/showthread.php?t=21669&page=4

It contains instructions on the delete the upper and lower filters fix

Also, there is a STICKY posted in this forum that contains a file from Microsoft and instructions that will do this registry edit automatically instead of having to do it manually.


And here's another method that will do this automatically for you if you're afraid to edit the registry manually.

http://forums.driverguide.com/showthread.php?t=22131
(automatic fix, post #7, download file: CdGone.zip)

After performing this registry fix, just reboot the pc. Now your drive should be visible in My Computer and work properly.