Cannot burn or copy CD in iTunes 8~ tried everything!

Question

Hello,
I hope someone can help, I'm at my wits end!
Since updating to iTunes 8 I haven't been able to burn or copy a CD on iTunes or Roxio. I followed the directions from Warlock in this thread
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=8345138#8345138
too have had the same problem and the problem is the result of the "UpperFilter" having lost or broken its link to the Gear CD / DVD driver that Itunes install. The fix I used is not easy but if you take your time you should have no problem. 1. Remove all iTune and related componets. Here is the Apple support site http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1925?viewlocale=en_US. You can try to download and reinstall iTunes at this time but when I tried it still had the same error so I continued with the following: WARNING the gear driver is used by some other programs, review the Gear site to see if any other program you have could be affected. You may need to reinstall the affected programs. 2. Then manually uninstall the Gear's driver and this is the Gear site http://www.gearsoftware.com/wiki/index.php?title=DRIVERS:Windows_-_Updating%2C_removing%2C_64_bit_versions%2C_etc#Manual_Removal_.E2.80.9 332-bit. 3. Download and install itunes. iTunes will reinstall the gear driver.
After reinstalling iTunes I get a message "iTunes Setup Assistant-
iTunes was not properly installed. If you wish to import or burn CDs. you need to reinstall iTunes." I did uninstall and then reinstall and got the same message.
Now what? Anybody got any ideas? My computer has Windows XP.
TIA

Answer 1

I have finally been able to nail this problem down on this particular 32bit XP system, and while it may not be the correct solution for everybody I'm going to tack it onto the end of this thread in the hope that it might save some time for anyone Googling the problem.
I have wasted literally days on this problem with multiple uninstall, install, reinstall cycles of iTunes, Gear drivers, Gear driver removers, QuickTime and other assorted Apple sundries. I have made more Registry edits than I can count. All to no avail.
The basic problem, at least on this machine, was that the Gear drivers simply refused to install onto the system regardless of whether they were coming from the iTunes installer or the stand-alone Gear installer. I could see the installer reporting the attempt to install, and I could check the installer logs and see the same thing, but upon rebooting the drivers just would not be there. No entries in the Registry, and no .sys or .dll files in System32.
In the end the following worked for me, so here it is for reference. It may be possible to miss out some of these steps but I'm not going back to check!
*1. Uninstall EVERYTHING Apple related; iTunes, QuickTime, iPod drivers, Bonjour, the lot. Reboot between each removal if necessary.*
*2. Uninstall the Gear driver installer if used.*
*3. Reboot*
*4. Download and run the latest iTunes installer. When the installer has finished DO NOT yet click on the OK or reboot button. Leave the installer window(s) open.*
*5. Navigate to C:\Documents And Settings\All Users\Application Data and look for an alphanumerically named folder containing an 'x86' subfolder. Mine was called {3276BE95AF08_429F_A64FCA64CB79BCF6} but it might change from system to system.*
*6. Copy this folder to the Desktop.*
*7. Complete the iTunes installer operations. If no reboot is required, uncheck the box to run iTunes on completion.*
*8. Reboot.*
*9. Open the copied folder on the Desktop, open the x86 sub-folder, right-click the GearAspiWDM.inf file and choose Install.*
*10. Reboot.*
*11. Run iTunes and hope that the drivers have installed correctly.*
As I said, there's no guarantee this will work for anybody else but it worked for me and I had tried just about every "solution" as posted in the various forums. On the surface it looks to have been a simple case of the installer copying the Gear install files to the All Users subfolder, but then not actually running the installer.
I really do hope this information helps someone else avoid the days of frustration I have suffered with this issue.