Problem playing DVDs

I have an Inspiron 8100, PIII, 1.13GHz, 15" SXGA+, 512mb RAM, with a Samsung CDRW/DVD fixed drive, running WinXP Home Edition. Lately, I have been having trouble playing DVDs in the drive. The video will start to stutter and then it will freeze up. Sometimes, I have to restart the computer because nothing works at all. I use PowerDVD, but this problem also happens when I use PC Friendly.

I have noticed that the drive tray gets quite hot to the touch after playing a DVD for a while. Is this normal? Has anyone else had this video problem? Any advice would be appreciated.