Should I be able to read information on a cd-rw disk that's placed in a cd-r drive?

I have both a cd-r and cd-rw on my computer. I used the cd - rw to store photo files (JPG) and Quicken information in folders along with other folders of information that I back up. I tried reading this disk on my cd -r drive and it either does nothing or says I can't access the drive. Yet it reads okay in the cd-rw drive.

Is that the way it works, or do I have a problem?

TIA:confused:

You should only strike this problem if you have an old CDROM drive ie under 8x. These earlier drives aren't designed to read CDRW discs (different reflective properties to CDRs), also some of the earlier drives can't read 'open' discs - that is discs that have not been finalised.

If it's a newer drive (8x or faster) then it may be getting dirty, if the drive is out of warranty you may want to try to clean it yourself: http://www.deinmeister.de/cdrep_e.htm

Both CD R drives are 40x and clean. The only thing that does read okay are a few music CDs I copied on CD Rs; Is this something peculiar to CD RW disks, can they only be read on CD RW drives? . Do CD-RW disks age or something to change reflective properties.

Eventually CDRWs become unreadable but the lifespan is quoted as 50 years or more. You may just have some bad discs. Try another brand.