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A new external USB DVD drive works on some Windows 10 computers but not others. VLC 3.0.11 would not play a DVD with the new drive attached to a fairly new laptop with Windows 10 pro. It did work on an older laptop with Windows 10 enterprise version 17134. It did not work on a desktop with Windows 10 home version 19041. The older laptop and the desktop installed the same USB DVD driver. When the DVD was put in the internal drive on that same desktop, VLC had not problems with it. In all cases, the DVD was listed in Windows Explorer. I had similar results when trying to use VLC to play a music CD on the different systems. Windows Media Player could play a music CD in the external drive even when VLC could not.

When trying to play a DVD, VLC gave error messages such as “VLC unable to open to open the MRL file://f:video_ts_vts.....”. A portion of the VLC debugging log from trying to open the disk is pasted below.

How can I fix this?

Disk option
main debug: processing request item: dvd:///E:/, node: Playlist, skip: 0
main debug: rebuilding array of current - root Playlist
main debug: rebuild done - 1 items, index 0
main debug: starting playback of new item
main debug: resyncing on dvd:///E:/
main debug: dvd:///E:/ is at 0
main debug: creating new input thread
main debug: Creating an input for 'dvd:///E:/'
main debug: requesting art for new input thread
main debug: using timeshift granularity of 50 MiB
main debug: using timeshift path: C:\Users\STEVEA~1\AppData\Local\Temp
main debug: `dvd:///E:/' gives access `dvd' demux `any' path `/E:/'
main debug: creating demux: access='dvd' demux='any' location='/E:/' file='E:\'
main debug: looking for access_demux module matching "dvd": 15 candidates
main debug: looking for meta fetcher module matching "any": 1 candidates
lua debug: Trying Lua scripts in C:\Users\SteveandGail\AppData\Roaming\vlc\lua\meta\fetcher
lua debug: Trying Lua scripts in C:\Program Files (x86)\VideoLAN\VLC\lua\meta\fetcher
main debug: no meta fetcher modules matched
main debug: looking for art finder module matching "any": 2 candidates
lua debug: Trying Lua scripts in C:\Users\SteveandGail\AppData\Roaming\vlc\lua\meta\art
lua debug: Trying Lua scripts in C:\Program Files (x86)\VideoLAN\VLC\lua\meta\art
lua debug: Trying Lua playlist script C:\Program Files (x86)\VideoLAN\VLC\lua\meta\art\00_musicbrainz.luac
lua debug: skipping script (unmatched scope) C:\Program Files (x86)\VideoLAN\VLC\lua\meta\art\00_musicbrainz.luac
lua debug: Trying Lua playlist script C:\Program Files (x86)\VideoLAN\VLC\lua\meta\art\01_googleimage.luac
lua debug: skipping script (unmatched scope) C:\Program Files (x86)\VideoLAN\VLC\lua\meta\art\01_googleimage.luac
lua debug: Trying Lua playlist script C:\Program Files (x86)\VideoLAN\VLC\lua\meta\art\02_frenchtv.luac
lua debug: skipping script (unmatched scope) C:\Program Files (x86)\VideoLAN\VLC\lua\meta\art\02_frenchtv.luac
lua debug: Trying Lua playlist script C:\Program Files (x86)\VideoLAN\VLC\lua\meta\art\03_lastfm.luac
lua debug: skipping script (unmatched scope) C:\Program Files (x86)\VideoLAN\VLC\lua\meta\art\03_lastfm.luac
main debug: no art finder modules matched
dvdnav warning: ifoOpenVMGI(): Invalid main menu IFO (VIDEO_TS.IFO).
dvdnav warning: ifoOpenVMGI(): Invalid main menu IFO (VIDEO_TS.BUP).
dvdnav error: vm: vm: failed to read VIDEO_TS.IFO
dvdnav warning: cannot open DVD (E:)
qt debug: IM: Setting an input
dvdread warning: Invalid IFO for title 0 (VIDEO_TS.IFO).
dvdread warning: Invalid IFO for title 0 (VIDEO_TS.BUP).
dvdread error: DVDISOVolumeInfo, failed to read ISO9660 Primary Volume Descriptor
dvdread warning: cannot open VMG info
main debug: no access_demux modules matched
main debug: creating access: dvd:///E:/
main debug: (path: E:\)
main debug: looking for access module matching "dvd": 26 candidates
main debug: no access modules matched
main debug: dead input
qt debug: IM: Deleting the input
main debug: changing item without a request (current 0/1)
main debug: using item 0
main debug: starting playback of new item
main debug: resyncing on dvd:///E:/

Is this a typo on your part? "VLC unable to open to open the MRL file://f:video_ts_vts....."

The reason I'm asking is because according to the log your dvd drive is E:/

Can you check? Hit Ctrl + D to open the disc menu. It shows in the middle what the drive letter is set to.

Hitchhiker - both drive letters were correct at the time. I had an external drive connected as E: when I wrote down the error message, so the DVD drive was F:. I went back later to get the debug log and the external hard drive was not connected at that time. Sorry for the confusion.

Thanks for the clarification.

As an initial troubleshooting step hit Ctrl + P to open prefs in vlc and then click the big Reset Preferences button at the bottom. Save, exit and restart vlc and then check to see if it'll play the dvd.

If that fails it's possible that the dvd is encrypted. To get around that problem download libdvdcss from here and place it in the vlc directory and exit File Explorer. Then try to play the disc again.

Sometimes the drive won't launch a dvd in vlc in spite of it being the default player. You can usually force it to open bij hitting Windows key + E to open File Explorer and then right click the DVD drive and click Open.

If none of the above works please post again.

HItchhiker - This was indirectly helpful. Resetting the preferences did not make a difference, which is as expected since the DVD played on the internal drive. That also indicated that the disc is not encrypted. I played it once from the Windows Explorer. Then I put it in the internal drive and it played as expected. When I put it back in the external drive, even starting from Windows Explorer didn't work. This got me looking more closely at the VLC Open Disc menu. I scrolled down and noticed that it was set to look for the MRL file on the internal drive instead of the external drive. Changing that solved the problem on my desktop.

Now I'll need to wait until I get access to the church laptop that started this investigation to see if that could be an issue with the external drive connected when the laptop has no internal optical drive. It really needs to work on that laptop as simply as possible.