Why won't regular CDs play on my Windows 7 system?

I've got some regular CDs that I cannot get to play on my Windows 7 (64 bit) system. When I try to play them I get the message:

"Windows Media Player cannot play the file. The Player might not support the file type or might not support the codec that was used to compress the file."

This is a relatively new system so I've never tried playing CDs on it before. Do I need to load a specific codec to play CDs? I would think Windows would play CDs out of the box.

Solution 1:

WMP comes with pre-installed codecs which have never satisfied me. You should install a codec pack and try again. I personally recommend CCCP Codec Pack.