Hi all - mate ofmine has just bought a new Dell laptop with vista. It keeps 'losing' sight of the dvd burner, jamming with discs in, refusing to burn, and keeps showing various system runtime errors. I know Vista isn't perfect, but is this all down to the op system, or is there a hardware issue?
Could be a faulty drive - unusual but possible.
First try uninstalling the drive in Control Panel, then just wait a few minutes or reboot and allow Vista to find the drivers for it.
I forgot to add - since your mate has just bought it, he should take it back and let the supplier resolve the issue. He shouldn't be having problems with a new laptop.