Lost my Burner and CD-Rom!

I'm running XP on Pentium 4-2.4,It's been super stable for a year now all of a sudden,it does not show either my Cd-rom or my burner.Every thing else is OK.I've checked the connections and cables etc.They now do not show up in Device manager.They show on screen during loading as normal.it would appear to be a Windows problem.They are on the same cable as master and Slave.Do I really have to reinstall XP? Or are the Masters of Upper kingdom known as Major geeks going to save me?Please

 

Sorry, I should have told you what I had already tried.A reboot first,then a system restore.Didn't help.Just in case,I'll try a change of cables as they are both on the same one.Press on regardless!

 

Have you by chance checked in Device Manager/View/ that show hidden devices is checked

 

Sorry, but I'm using Linux at the moment.

But, if you click on HELP. And type "assign drive letter" in the search space, it will tell you exactly how to fix your problem.

 

You can't assign a drive letter to something not detected...

Have you checked to see if the drives even show up in the BIOS?

Can you boot to them?

Any bangs in Device Manager?

Try System Restore?

Check Event Logs for errors pertaining to this?

 

I had the same problem a few years ago when I installed a copy of CD Creator, which turned out to be a beta.

When it did not work I uninstalled it and lost my CD drives in Windows even though the BIOS detected them (Linux had no problem).

Since I could not re-install CD Creator I had to backup using Linux then reformat and reinstall.

What I would suggest is booting to a floppy and trying to access the CD drives. If you can use the drives it would mean that there is nothing wrong with the computer, and you have a Windows problem.

If it's a Windows problem I would go to add and remove hardware and try to force Windows to see the drives.

If that does not work I would remove the drives from the computer, reboot and make sure the BIOS now knows there are no CD drives. Then put one drive in, make sure the BIOS knows it's there, and see if windows can find it.

 

Should have come here, we cold have saved you a format and reinstall.

 

I'd tried all the other suggestions except yours.I tried removing the drives and then making sure that the bios didn't see them ,before reconnecting the drives.I started windows and thought you were a genius,trying the obvious.I could see the drives.tried putting a CD in, system froze,repeated all the above as one is wont to do,sometimes I'd see them ,try CD system freeze.other times they didn't show up.I'm sure I have a windows problem,can I reinstall Win XP over itself.What other ideas to save me from formatting and reinstalling?

 

you havent said if you tried new chipset drivers or not so i would definitely try that you tried a system restore what about trying LAST KNOWN GOOD CONFIGURATION can be accessed by pressing F8 when starting your pc

if all else fails and you really want to install windows boot from your cd rom as you would on a clean drive follow the prompts to install then choose the repair option which will re-install all your windows files bearing in mind youll have to re-install all your windows updates
just like robo says sorry m8 i was typing when you posted