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Dvd drives gone missing

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  • Sparky
    TDF Member
    • Jan 2013
    • 64

    Dvd drives gone missing

    I have to dvd drives on my PC, on Saturday the computer was all fine and working, I switched it on yesterday and it hung at the point of booting as the start sequence looks at both dvd's and then the HDD.
    I got into the bios and changed it so it boots from the HDD first it's now all fine and loaded up windows.

    after starting it i checked my computer and both drives are not there,
    I checked device manager there is no line for dvd/cdrom, so there is no yellow ! as there is no line.
    I googled it and found a list of options to try from microsoft, the first being go into regedit and delete the lower and upper filters, i've done that still nothing, another option was to uninstall the three ide options in device manager and let them reinstall on booting. I tried 6 out of the 7 options, the only option i didn't try was the one about adding lines into regedit, (i'm not that confident doing stuff in there)
    as the computer boots it see's both the drives, if i go into the bios settings it will see them as well.

    I have also tried unplugging one at a time, I've tried different ide leads (found that it takes longer to boot into windows??) with one of the leads it found and installed the DVD rewriter but when I put a music or software cd in, it informed me that it could not read them and i needed to format them, when I had that lead plugged in I looked in device manager and it was there the drivers were up to date and it was working ok, (well according to windows it was!!)
    I tried a different cd rewriter that I took off another pc and it hung on the starting windows page, when i took it out and put it back to normal the pc started in safe mode (mainly as I had pressed the power button) the lead that had seen one of the drives was plugged back in it saw the drive again but then it disappeared and didn't come back.

    I have it currently on the old lead as the pc boots quicker, both drives are plugged in there is power to them as I can open the drawers.

    I've run out of options, is there anybody that has an idea as to what it could be, running windows 7 pro.
  • Steve Clark
    Established TDF Member
    • Dec 2012
    • 2840

    #2
    Check psu voltage. One of the 12v rails may be dead.

    If it is, don't experiment - switch it off and never turn it on again in case it decides to kill the motherboard next.

    Comment

    • jb2cool
      Sorry for being a dick
      • Dec 2012
      • 1641

      #3
      I'd make sure everything is ok in the bios first before you try troubleshooting Windows. Make sure you can see the drive in there.

      Could be power, could be that some of the headers are turned off/failed on the motherboard, could be that your drive has blown up (unlikely as it sounds like you have more than 1).

      Is there power going to the drives? Can you eject the,?

      Comment

      • Sparky
        TDF Member
        • Jan 2013
        • 64

        #4
        Thanks for the replies

        Originally posted by Steve Clark
        Check psu voltage. One of the 12v rails may be dead.

        If it is, don't experiment - switch it off and never turn it on again in case it decides to kill the motherboard next.
        How can i tell if one of the 12v rails is dead? and where is the best place to check the voltage?, both of the drives have power to them as they both eject, when I managed to get one of them working the drive was showing but it just would not read any disks.

        Originally posted by jb2cool
        I'd make sure everything is ok in the bios first before you try troubleshooting Windows. Make sure you can see the drive in there.

        Could be power, could be that some of the headers are turned off/failed on the motherboard, could be that your drive has blown up (unlikely as it sounds like you have more than 1).

        Is there power going to the drives? Can you eject the,?
        The bios is showing both of them when it is booting and when I go into the bios settings it shows them there but with no data as i assume that is because there is nothing actually in the drives, i thought about one of the drives failing so unplugged one at a time still did not show them.
        The drives are older than the motherboard as i upgraded that a few years ago.
        I can eject the drives so there is power going to them both.

        Comment

        • The Real Paulus
          Self Defecating
          • Jul 2016
          • 1842

          #5
          I once had the DVD drive disappear on one of my machines. I can't remember the exact fix but it involved poking round in dark corners.
          Here is a guide that might be useful:
          This article describes a problem with CD or DVD drives not work, or is missing, or not recognized after installing or uninstalling programs.

          Comment

          • Sparky
            TDF Member
            • Jan 2013
            • 64

            #6
            Originally posted by The Real Paulus
            I once had the DVD drive disappear on one of my machines. I can't remember the exact fix but it involved poking round in dark corners.
            Here is a guide that might be useful:
            https://support.microsoft.com/en-gb/...other-programs
            Thanks for the link, that is the one that I had found, I've done all of them except for number 6 which was adding lines into the registry, I'm not that confident doing things in there as it can really screw the machine up if you get it wrong.

            Comment

            • The Real Paulus
              Self Defecating
              • Jul 2016
              • 1842

              #7
              Originally posted by Sparky
              Thanks for the link, that is the one that I had found, I've done all of them except for number 6 which was adding lines into the registry, I'm not that confident doing things in there as it can really screw the machine up if you get it wrong.
              Yeah, they say that it can be dangerous. I guess I've been lucky over the years. I used to hack away at the registry in times past and only ever achieved what I'd set out to do.

              I think it's a bit like the human brain. No one knows what a lot of it does!

              Comment

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