dvd rom and writer missing!

[gremlyn]

I've had no problems with my dvd rom and writer (seperate). but today, i find that they are both missing from "my computer". I've opened several programs to see if they can read any of my drives but no. I've gone into devide managaer and they are there. When i go into device manager - properties - driver info ....system32 comes up as if thats where its all located.

When i put a dvd into any of my drives, its like my pc doesnt communocate with them. I even loaded deamon tools drive up to see if it would show in my computer but the deamon drive doesnt.

I was thinking, maybe i need to reinstall my drivers again - so i looked high and low but fcant find any.

my dvd rom is - HL - DT - ST - DVD ROM GDR8161B (dont know manufacturer)

and dvd writer is - Pioneer DVD RQ DVR - 105

Both of these came with my pc when i bought it. All i have is a master cd (but doesnt work anyway because rom doesnt work)

please please can someone help please. i really dont know what has happeneed. all i remember doing a couple days ago is - uninstalling anydvd (as i never used it) and i did a system restore (that failed). the system restore was for somehting unrelated to my drives)

i've googled for drivers downloads but cant find any. all i find are firmwares.

any suggestions appreciated

[bazooka]

You could try to uninstall that ide channel that the drives are on and reboot and let windows redetect them.

[gremlyn]

will windows find the 2 drives? i mean, what if i dont have the drivers etc on pc etc? or is that a different thing?

please tell me how to uninstall the IDE channels as i havent a clue.

thanks

[glockjs]

device manager>expand ide/ata>right click on the ide channel they are on, should be secondary>uninstall and reboot windows.


and yes xp will find them

ya might wanna check if they show in bios too

[jimmalenko]

Optical drives (CD/DVD-ROMS, CD/DVDRWs) don't need or have drivers of their own. Windows XP supplies its own generic drivers to run them. Do what glock and zook said.

[gremlyn]

ok. i did what was suggested above. Well, under ide, i couldnt find the roms, but i found them when i extended the CD/DVD section in device manager.

so i deleted everything under cd/dvd. i rebooted, and xp found new hardware - a little bubble on bottom right came up and listed all the drives that was there previously i.e. rom drive, writer drive etc.

when all that was done, i went back into my computer to see if any of my drives showed but none!!!

so i looked in device manager to see what was going pn and this is what i got - the same as before, before uninstalling etc...

[see attached]

it didnt work and i'm really worried (even moreso)

[bazooka]

The cmos battery might need replaced.

The cables to the drives might be loose.

[gremlyn]

thanks guys for all your help.

i did a last minute search and came to this page >>

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/320553/EN-US/

followed the instructions and voila. i can see all my drives now.


the culprit was anydvd leaving its remains behind. i noticed it said patched in the regkey when i edited my reg.

thanks again for all your help guys.

[bazooka]

I am glad you solved your problem.

Thanks for sharing.

The next time somebody has this problem, we know what to tell them.