DVDRW Uninstalled itself???
 

What happened was that I popped a DVD into the drive (The Order) and a popup appeared after I ran Window Media Player saying that the number of times I can change the DVD region has expired. I never heard of anything like this.

I restarted the computer and logged in and a Found new hardware wizard popup appeared saying that it found a new device and it turns out that somehow the DVDRW device had uinstalled itself and the popup identified it as "~ & UdK!'g N" I tried to find the driver for it but it appears to be gone now. Any idea on how to fix this issue???

It's a Samsung TS-H522 16x12x DVDRW.

there is a set number of times you can switch the region code on a DVD player. have you or anyone else chaned the region code? try RMAing it to samsung.

If it is showing up as garbled text in Device Manager, the electronics in the drive are horked. The region code limit being reached is probably just another symptop of the drive's electronics failing.

If it is under warranty, send it back, if not, time to buy a new one.

Well strange enough it starts working again. I don't know what the hell that was all about.

I guess you should feel lucky. I am still having problems with my Dell. Computers - can live with 'em - can't live without 'em. ;)

whenever you put in a foreign dvd in your dvd player automatically uses up your chances (I think 4 in all). I dont believe there is a way to fix this.

Actually every DVD drive I have used in a computer, you can assign the region in the Windows Device Manager, and the only way it will change for a foreign disk, is if you manually go back to Device Manager to change it. I have never seen any "Auto" mode in there, but if it did exist, just manually setting your region code would prevent a foreign disk from being played in that drive.