Windows Ate My CDROMs!

[whovous]

I have had my share of problems with a new build. 1.5G p4 on a Gigabyte GA-8IRXP. I am using a clean install of Windows ME, and had to update a fair number of drivers in ME with the disk provided by Gigabyte.

The ME install went smoothly. All hardware was recognized with the exception of several of the mobo devices. Apparently I got carried away installing drivers because after one of a zillion reboots both of my CD devices (both Lite-On, one a burner, one a DVD-ROM) no longer showed up in Explorer. Instead, both were listed as "removable drives." Putting a disk in a drive did nothing, and the disk could not be accessed in any way.

Device Manager does not show any CDROM devices or controllers. Under DISK DRIVES, in addition to my HD and FD, it shows (not sure I recall exact wording) two "Winbond MS Drivers." When I delete them and reboot, they just reappear again.

The Add New Hardware Wizard does not help, either. It does not find either CDROM, and telling it what to find did not work either, since there is no device category for CDROMs other than 1394 or USB devices.

How do I get Windows to recognize these devices again? Please don't tell me to reinstall, I just went through that as a result of getting a little crazy with my overclocking options.

Thanks in advance,
Whovous

 

[spie34]

try just unhooking the cables then booting up then rebooting and hooking the cables back up. sounds like to me you got a bad set of drivers or something. I don't run me and never have ran that worthless os but I am thinking that you can to a regedit/restore from dos? i don't know. I know in 98se you could do that. or do you have some sort of system restore? is there any drivers listed in the properties of what they are now? if not try to install a driver.

 

[whovous]

They were recognized by ME earlier in the day. They went away while I was updating drivers for the new mobo.

Device Manager does show one yellow exclamation mark for a Winbond (there's that word again) Smart Card Reader. The Exclam is for a driver problem there that I cannot solve. If I try to remove that device from Device Manager, I get a BSOD. Note that the Smart Card Reader is a part of the mobo, and that I have no need for it.

 

[earthman]

This issue is with the mainboard, not ME. You need to delete your enum key and start again. I would check the mainboard manufacturers website to see if there are any known issues like this.

 

[whovous]

It turns out I found the answer in the MS Knowledge Base. It involved using Device Manager to alter a properties setting of the HD controller.

But Earthman, what is an "enum key" and how do I delete it? That is a new term to me.

 

[whovous]

The CDROM drives are gone again, and the fix does not work this time.

What IS an "enum key?"

 

[GonzoDaGr8]

<< They were recognized by ME earlier in the day. They went away while I was updating drivers for the new mobo.

Device Manager does show one yellow exclamation mark for a Winbond (there's that word again) Smart Card Reader. The Exclam is for a driver problem there that I cannot solve. If I try to remove that device from Device Manager, I get a BSOD. Note that the Smart Card Reader is a part of the mobo, and that I have no need for it. >>



Look to see if you can disable the smart card reader in the BIOS..At least would get one thing out of the way for ya.

enum is a key in the registry, but I wouldn't suggest poking aroung in the registry unless you know what you are doing..

EDIT: since this is a new setup, did you set BIOS to auto detect your drives? Are they showing up @POST? Last but not least and I know you don't want to hear this, but since you just got this going, you are not too far into things to where you could just re-install windows and start fresh..Good luck

 

[FUBAR]

you may try to boot into safe mode and see if your drives are in there. Delete anything you have 2 of and they should redetect with the new drivers you installed on the system. Do that for anything above system devices, there are a couple in there that there will be dupes of.

 

[FalseChristian]

Windows is a memory hog and when it runs out it'll search for anything else to eat to satisfy its insatiable appetite!

 

[whovous]

Very last things first - I have 512Meg of DDRAM, and can reasonably hope that if Windows is that much of a memory hog that Bill Gates will choke on it.

More important is that I've kludged a solution to the problem that I think will stick, although I'd still like a real fix as well. The GA-8IRXP is a RAID board, though I am using only one HD. I had it on IDE1 and the CDROMs on IDE2, with the "RAID" IDEs (3&4) left empty. I moved the HD to IDE3, where it worked, but was recognized as something other than a DeathStar drive. The other problems remained.

I then moved the CDROMs from IDE2 to IDE1, and they reappeared in Windows, where they remain. They should have been drives F & G, but were drives G&H instead, since the mystery "removable" drives were still there, only as F & I instead of the G&H positions they occupied previously. I deleted them via Device Manager and they seem to be staying deleted for the time being.

In response to some of the other questions and suggestions:

1. I have never been able to find anything recognizable as a smart card reader in the BIOS, hence cannot disable same there.
2. Yes, BIOS is set to autodetect my drives, and they always showed up at POST.
3. I had earlier tried booting into safe mode. I thought I reported earlier that the CDROMs always did show up there. I deleted all manner of things via Device Manager, but to no useful end.
4. To answer an earlier suggestion, System Restore was no help. It said nothing had changed since my one and only restore point.
5. I suppose that reinstalling Windows remains a viable option, since there is very little on the machine to date. I am inclined, however, to stick with my kludge for now instead.
6. One other variable is that this new machine has yet to be put online. Perhaps getting it there and running Windows Update will be of some use as well.