E drive not reading disks

​I have a dell xps t600r, which is quite old. My e drive is not reading disks. I'm trying to restore data from one of my collegues back up disks but when i try to click on the e drive in the drop down box it keeps reverting back to the c drive automatically. (it does make the sound like the e drive is trying to read the disk) when i try and run the e drive off the main menu on the start up page it just says the device is not ready . Can anyone help me beacuse i can't restore any of my data on my computer!!​