Optical Drive Issue
 

I've managed to sort out almost all of the issues that seem to come along with building your own computer except this one - whenever I play cds or dvds through my optical drive the sound is muddy and distorted. It wasn't like this when I first put the computer together and I can't figure out what's causing it. I've taken steps to fix it like uninstalling and reinstalling the drivers, replacing the pata cable and clearing away the wires to make sure it wasn't another cable running too close to it and causing the distortion - all to no avail.

While I'm not too surprised there's a problem with it (the cd/dvd burner was included for free when I ordered the case through Tigerdirect - - I know, Tigerdirect rebates = trouble!!), it's still pretty annoying and any sort of help would be appreciated.

XP Pro Service Pack 2
Intel 1.86 Core 2 Duo
ATI Radeon x1950 PRO GPU
2 GB Corsair DDR2 SDRAM 5400
and since I'm using an integrated sound card:
Intel D975XBX Mobo
optical drive in question:
NEC ND-3550A Internal 16X DVD Burner

...

Is this with digital audio? (device manager, ...) If not, change it and pull the analog audio cable entirely.

What are you using for speakers? Is the computer gain too high or low so you have to compensate at the speaker amp?

Otherwise I'd be looking for any filters or "enhancements" in the sound control panel. Depends on the driver set but uninstalling doesn't necessarily remove bogus settings.

With the analog audio cable connected/disconnected or digital audio selected/deselected it still doesn't make a difference - the distortion is still there. I originally figured that the bundled Intel Audio Studio took special liberties with my settings and that's why the distortion is there - but no matter what I do with the program nothing rectifies the issue. And also, the distortion is only there when playing dvds and cds - mp3s and such play sans distortion.

I've got a 2.1 Logitech speaker set that works perfectly when connected to my laptop.