AAARRGGHH!!!! Pc not recognizing CD-ROM

Factual Questions
1

Oh, please help me before I do something rash!

My cd-rom drive was working like a charm… 'til today.

Windows detects the drive… it shows up in device manager… it shows up in Windows Explorer.

But I pop a cd in and nothing launches. I click on the cd-rom icon or click on the D:\cdrom drive in Windows Explorer and get this:

D:\ is not accessible
The device is not ready

I even uninstalled and reinstalled it. Same error. God, oh, God, if I’m not able to listen to my Arch Enemy mp3s with my CD-Rom I’m not going to be held responsible for what happens.

Any ideas?

2

Get another one, they don’t last forever. More likely than not the laser eye is dirty. Some compressed air usually does the trick if you know where that eye is. I usually rip the top of the cdrom case open & clean it by hand, but these days cdrom drives are cheap, so perhaps you should get a new one?

Whenyou take the top off, the lens stares you in the face.

3

Also, the cdrom could be dirty. Look at the bottom of it & make sure its clean. I usually clean them with water. Use another cdrom disk, etc. & see if they work. Might not be a compatible cdrom format on one disk.

4

But I just bought it 4 weeks ago!

And it was working fine last week!

Whine!

5

1: Loosen and re-tighten drive cables. Did you add another drive like a ZIP drive or anything to the system between the CD working an not working? If unit is master switch it to slave more (or vice versa) and change jumpers appropriately for the CD and any other IDE devices on the cable (ie if CD is slave other must be master-if CD is master other drive must be slave).
2: Boot CD in real mode DOS with DOS drivers to make sure it’s not a windows driver conflict problem. If unit fails to see CD with DOS drivers you can be pretty sure it’s a hardware issue.

6

So send it back and get another one - or at least talk to the people that sold you the thing

7

Hey, thanks everyone.

I know this isn’t a pc repair forum and that I’ve asked more than my far share of pc questions, but you’ve really helped me out.

I’ve determined that the cd-rom crapped out on me after a whopping 4 weeks on the job. I wish I could bad mouth the manufacturer of this fine device.

Anways, just wanted to extend a sincere thank you to all who read, and especially those who posted.

-dietrologia

p.s. – How are those I/O Magic stocks doing? I bet they’re tanking!

8

just for future reference, you could attempt to clear the NVram for your system – that occasionally fixes the problem as well

9

been there, done that.

(but never heard about ‘NVRAM’ till I was on this board)

10

One oddity I came across was with Windows ME.

My CD writer was sown on device manager with a red cross on it and on MyComputor it was shown as a generic removable media device - not as a CD rom.

Turned out that the Second IDE channel had somehow been disabled.After mucho hunting around I finally twigged and clicked on Dual Fifo and re-enable it.Alls fine now but I’ve no idea how it happened in the first place.

11

“Windows detects the drive”

He said. So, its not the operating system.

Who made the drive? So far only HP drives work forever for me.

12

I have a cd writer that was doing the exact same thing. I cleaned the laser, tried to reinstall, changed IDE cables, and so on, but nothing worked. I finally took it all the way apart, and one of the gears in the mechanism that moves the laser back and forth had popped out of line with the other gears. I pushed it back into place, and it has worked like a champ for the past year. One thing that I noticed when it wasn’t working was that when I inserted a cd, it sounded like it was spinning up as fast as it would go then it would slow down and then speed up again, and continue this cycle while the light on the front would blink when it was in the fast part of the cycle, but stay off in the slow part of the cycle. Once I put the gear back in place, it would blink (while reading the table of contents and disc information, I guess) and then settle into a steady speed.

Does the drive itself exhibit any strage behavior since it stopped working? If it does, it is probably a mechanical problem such as a dirty lens, stuck laser, bad motor, etc. instead of a software problem.