DVD drive dissapereared?

So while i was gone at work the DVD drive suddenly dissaperaed and the drives are now randomly gone.

I need to find new firmware or something

the model is

Optiarc DVD+-RW 5540A


Can anyone help?

 

Does Device Manager list anything under DVD / CD-ROM drives? If it does, right click and select uninstall. If it doesn't, and also after step 1, go to the top of the list in Device Manager and right click and select Scan for hardware changes. This may fix the problem.

John

 

It said a problem occured when it tried to install them. Any other ideas?

 

So it can see the hardware but doesn't want to reinstall the driver. It seems that either a driver or a registry entry is corrupted. What would I do next? Assuming the ODD is on the secondary IDE channel, uninstall that channel and redetect it. If the ODD shares the primary IDE channel then this procedure should work but there is s slight risk because the HDD is on the channel.

Next I would look for the latest Intel chipset driver package and install it.

Also take a look in the BIOS and see if it detects the ODD.

Once you are certain that your computer's hardware and software are OK then suspicion must fall on the ODD.

Is there a Dell diagnostics package (it used to be through booting off the Drivers and Utilities CD). What does that report?

John

 

I found the fix at the official Microsoft site. I just had to delete a single file from the registry called Lowerfilters

Thanks for the help. I appreciate it.

 

Thanks for reporting back with the solution.

John

 

I'll save some of you some searching, and post the method incase another poor sould is looking. Read below and save it somewhere because it happens more than we hear about.
I had to reinstall my EZ-CD Creater program afterwards but not some of the others I have. Don't know what happened. I had not configured anything latley. Just went to use a drive and what thu.......!
I had three filters in reg key. One of them had a file extension or was named kind of differently. I believe one was an upper and the two were lowers. I dlelted them all.

The soloution below works like a charm.

[Microsoft Quote Disclaimer] Warning Serious problems might occur if you modify the registry incorrectly by using Registry Editor or by using another method. These problems might require that you reinstall your operating system. Microsoft cannot guarantee that these problems can be solved. Modify the registry at your own risk.
To resolve this behavior, follow these steps:

1. Start Registry Editor (Regedt32.exe). Back It Up!!!!!!!!
2. Locate the UpperFilters value under the following key in the registry:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\{4D36E965-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318}
3. On the Edit menu, click Delete, and then click OK.
4. Locate the LowerFilters value under the same key in the registry:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\{4D36E965-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318}
5. On the Edit menu, click Delete, and then click OK.
6. Quit Registry Editor.NOTE: After you remove the Upperfilters value and the Lowerfilters value, if you notice lost functionality in a particular program, such as CD recording software, you may need to reinstall that software. If the problem recurs, consult with the software vendor for assistance.