Inspiron M5110 Recovery Disks are not bootable?

Hello,

When I first got my Inspiron M5110 (Windows 7) laptop we made the recovery disk DVDs as suggested in the manual.  With a failed HDD 15 months later, the only choice was to buy a new hard drive. After installing the blank new drive, I tried to use the Recovery Disks to reinstall the system.  However, the system ignores the disks so nothing happens upon bootup.  I can press F2 for bios or F12 for boot options, and I can change the order to boot from the DVDs first.  When I use other generic bootup CDs, they work fine, so I know the order is reading correctly and the CD drive is working properly.  I also ran system diagnostics which recognized the new HDD, so all components are present.  I've inserted the DVDs into another computer and all the files seem to be there just as they should be.  Why isn't my laptop recognizing the Recovery Disks on bootup and launching some kind of reinstall program?  Is there any way to boot to a command prompt and run them manually?  Thanks for any help!

Ashley