The drive wont read other CDs.......
If the drive is kaput, don't despair. They are cheap (good one is less thna 50 bucks, cheap readers are about 25 bucks), and easy to replace. Still, first thing I would try is cleaning the drive with a drive cleaning disc.
when you click on 'my computer' on the desktop, can you see the cd drive? if not, is the power supply plugged into the back of the cd rom all the way? if it is, open device manager and browse the cd rom and make sure dirvers are installed, if they are, did you fiddle with the drive jumpers?