HP 300n or 300i DVD+RW not being nice

hi! ok so this is the problem, the drive has probably had it... it barly reads dvds at all, and only barly if its spotless, if its got the lighest scratch on it (that usually any dvd reader would have no troubles with) my drive treats it like its had a brick rubbed over it... ive cleaned the laser properly snd stuff, so i thought id try to update its firmware. ive got HP Anyreader installed like it tells me to but the updater tells me that no optical drives are found!!!
and ive seached the entire internet with no luck at finding any drivers for the 300n or 300i dvd rw. (windows says its a 300n but i think its exactly the same as a 300i) also ive reinstalled windows xp, ive tried it with vista and everything with no luck.
It says its drivers or something are usually on disc 1, but i dont have any cd's anymore, just the drive :/
so any ideas?

thanks lots

cya