Quote Originally Posted by nihil
It seems that we are assuming a BIOS problem? perhaps it is more simple.....?

1. What are the make, model, specs, and age of the machine that won't play these CDs? In particular the CD drive.
2. Does it actually see that there is media there?
3. What is the boot sequence in the BIOS of the offending machine?
4. What are the make and specifications of the CD media that won't play?
5. Will these CDs boot on equipment of a similar age/specification? (I saw your comment about your desktop, but that doesn't answer my question)
6. Is there a BIOS password set? If so, are you asked for it when you try to boot from CD?

Following on from Aard~'s comment
1. The machine was built by me in late January or early Febuary. The specs are shown at the link i gave:
Core 2 E6300 1.86Ghz
ASUS P5LD2 MoBo
1G ram
ATI Radeon X1300
Samsung DVD burner

2. Yes, in windows the media is seen and i can view all the folders and files inside.

3. Does that matter if i have already been able to start the boot from the CD? (i think its from the HD first though, but i do F8 so i don't have to change the startup order; i choose from the menu)

4.its a Samsung Lightscribe i got from Mwave, it burns DVDs and all, i don't know what other specs would be important, but i have a second CD drive that is older that it won't boot from either.

5. I don't have any other computers to try it on other than my other dell, which is older

6. No Bios password.

as i said in my other post, it will load boot menus from any of the CDs, but if the menu has images, they don't come up, and after i choose something, i always get an error, similar with each linux i boot.
This sounds what it might be to me:
Quote Originally Posted by rcgreen
Sounds like, after the kernel boots, it can't find the cdrom drive.
Yes, it's possible to boot from that drive, and then have no driver
for it. I don't know the solution, other than try another distro.
but i don't know for sure if this is it, or how to fix this.