WMP won't play CDs

I tried a couple of CDs to run on my computer through WMP and I got this error message on most of the songs:

Windows Media Player cannot read the CD. The disc might be dirty or damaged. Turn on error correction, and then try again.

I tried cleaning the CD and turning on error correction and that didn't help. Now my roommate tried to play the same CD with WMP and it worked.

Is this a driver problem, hardware problem, or application problem?

I got it to work through after fiddling with some settings. I switched 5.1 speaker setup to 2.0/2.1 in Creative's Audio Console and now it will play CDs, but I can still hear through all 5 speakers.

I don't know if this is a problem with my with OS, WMP, or the Driver though.