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Q: My computer CD drive was missed from my XP computer so I had it reinstalled by computer repair shop about four month ago.  I just realized that I cannot copy to the CD from my Picture folder but if I put in a CD and play it will work. The pop up sentence on screen says “Windows encountered a problem when trying to copy this folder.  What do you want windows to do?”  Then I clicked “Retry”.  It is not working.  Is my computer missing (copy file from CD drive) some of the file from CD drive?  It is not working.

Please advise me how can I make it work for a copy from my pictures folder to CD.

– C. C.
Crestview, Florida

A: I hate that little “Retry” button, because it leaves users with the false impression that if they just keep clicking it, their operation will eventually succeed.  It is only useful when there is some correctable condition standing in the way of your operation completing.  If you just click it without doing anything to fix what the system is complaining about, the operation will almost always fail again.  In your case, since you don’t even know what the problem is, of course you can’t fix it, and the Retry button shouldn’t even be there.

So, I hope you know that there are multiple types of optical disc drives in computers.  There are CD-ROMs, which are read-only, then there are CD-R and CD-RW drives which are writeable.  I won’t get into them here, but there are also DVD-based drives, and even Blu-Ray-based drives, in both read-only and writeable flavors.  So, C., the very first thing I would check is to make sure that the repair shop installed a writeable drive, and not just a CD-ROM drive.  You can generally tell if a drive is writeable by looking for the letters CD-RW printed on the drive’s front panel, or on the pop-out media tray.  If the drive says only CD-ROM, that means it is a read-only drive, and is not physically capable of writing to a disc.  Once you’ve verified that you have a writable drive, you’ll want to make sure you’re using fresh, writable media that isn’t scratched or otherwise damaged.  If you’ve verified both of those items, and you still can’t write files to your optical drive, you might be missing an interface driver for the device.  Each device installed in your computer needs one of these drivers so that Windows can interact with it properly.  Your system might have loaded a generic CD-ROM driver that allows the device to be read but not written to.  It seems like another trip to your repair shop is in order.  Tell them what you told me, and ask them to set-up your system to be able to write to discs.

Q: I am using Internet Explorer, when I enter a web address on my home page bar Bing seems to take over and will not allow me to get the web site. It goes right back to my home page (portalgrandecom.net). This has just recently happened. How do I correct this?

– Marvin T.
Odessa, Texas

A: The newest version of Internet Explorer is designed to perform searches right from the address bar.  If you enter text that is not a valid web address, the system reverts to doing a search on whatever you entered, and apparently your default search provider is Microsoft BING.  The website you mentioned is a perfect example.  There is no such site as portalgrandecom.net, (note to website users: click it and you’ll see what I mean!) and when I enter it in my address bar, I get a search page looking for it.  The correct URL you’re looking for there is portal.grandecom.net.