Computer Geniuses?

squisher

THE CALM ONE!!!!
Joined
Sep 25, 2006
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Vernon, B.C.
Help! I have windows XP and I've had to reload it, again after the computer buggering up and not 'booting' up. Well that's all fine and dandy but now the same as last time it happened, the computer is not 'seeing' my CD drive. How do I load or even find where this CD drive may be. Please help me!
 
Squish yer computer! Jus squish it! :)

-sorry, lost my head there a minute, good luck
 
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Oh I am about ready to squash this POS! If it weren't for finding the treehouse this computer would've been a total waste of money.
 
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HP Pavilion laptop pos barely over a year old, would never re-buy it. Last time this happened I had to get a friend of a friend to re-install the driver or whatever it is for my CD. When I go into 'my computer' there is no CD drive like there used to be just nothing. If you put a CD in the CD player you can hear it whirr around but nothing happens on the compute. I'm hoping I can learn how to fix this myself this time.
 
Go into device manager, scan for hardware changes. Run services.msc, look for any cd services that are stopped and start them.

FIRST reseat connection.

Fred
 
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Thanks Fred, now for the really stupid question. Device manager? How do I locate that?
 
devmgmt.msc from RUN or go to the My computer icon "right click," properties, hardware, device management.

Fred
 
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FIRST reseat connection.

Fred

What do you mean by this?

I've found the 'device' now and it says it's ok? I'll probably mess around with it until I screw it right up and then have to take it to someone to fix it. Frusturating as all hell I find this.

Thanks for the help!
 
Okay?

First the connection I was talking about was the one on your CD drive and the corrosponding one on the motherboard.

I'm calling shenanigans if you don't show screen shots of it in Device manager and not in my computer.

Fred
 
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Ok I'm really not down with my computer jargon. I can find it in that device manager and it says that everything is ok. But when I just go into my computer my hardrives are there, my files stored on this computer are there, but there is no drives with removable storage or whatever it's called none nothing. If I put the memory chip from my camera in the compute it immediately recognizes that but the cd/dvd drive is not there in 'my computer' but is there when I open the device manager? I dunno what's up I guess I'll have to try and touch base with the dude that fixed it last time for me :( .
 
Squishy, in the device manager right click on the cd drive and go to "Properties". Does it say "This device is working correctly"?. If not, what does it say?
 
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It says 'this device is working properly'. It says the location is 0(0) could this be the problem? I'm trying to copy and paste what it says but it doesn't seem to work in those 'programs'?
 
Hmmm...that's what it should say. I don't know what to tell you. If you put a CD in the drive what happens?
 
Shenanigans J/K

Did you run services.msc and start the CD if it was stopped.

Fred
 
Even though it's been working before, the situation you are describing could quite likely be related to a jumper setting problem (I'll explain that in a second). Often when there is a booting problem with Pavillions, they refer to the repair partition, which restores the operating system, but mucks up the boot order. HP usually sets their IDE devices (i.e. CDROM, Harddrive) to "Cable Select" or "CS". To fix this you need to set your harddrive jumper to master, and your cdrom to slave.
But that is for later on... and if its only a year old, it will probably void your warrenty.

Firstly lets try and replace the drivers for your cdrom. This will identify whether the OS is running inappropiate drivers for your device, or whether your OS has detected it at all.

Click -> Start
Click -> Run
Type "devmgmt.msc", then hit "OK"
The list of stuff here are the devices on your computer.
There should be a catagory called "DVD/CDROM drives"
If this catagory is not there, then we need to check that your BIOS is detected your CDROM at all. (READ FURTHUR ON)
If the catagory is there, then open it up. Assuming you only have one CD drive in your computer, there will be a single name.

Right-click on this name, and select "Uninstall".
This will remove the drive.
The next step is to get windows to reinstall the drive. To do this, from the top menu select "Action -> Scan for hardware changes".
Windows will do a scan to find your device.
If it finds a device like your cdrom, check whether its visible in "My Computer".
If your CDROM is in "my computer", then its beer o'clock.
If there is no device in "My computer", then its likely to be a driver related issue, and since you have internet, will be fairly easy to fix. (We'll deal with that if it comes up)

The other likely situation was that the BIOS may not be detecting it.
HP have decided to be rather flippant with their BIOS entry keys, so we'll guess them after you tried replacing the CDROM's drivers.
Let us know how you go with that.

Best of luck
Regards
Angus
 
Can also get to Device Manager through Settings>Control Panel>System>Hardware Tab>Device Mgr. Button.

Screen shot is achived by pressing PrtScrn Button over Insert/Home etc. Keys. This places a Screen Shot on the clipboard. Then, open up Paint (or other similair) and Paste (CtrlV) the clipboard contents(screen shot) intot he window and save. Some computers like Ctrl-PrntScr key combination. If you have several windows showing and want screen shot of jsut one (error message etc.) press key combo Alt-PrntScr to capture just the focussed (selected/clicked) window.

If problem is a series of steps in windows you don't think you are doing right; might try Debug Modes "Wink" (open source. Or, CamStudio. They are free, but can't see keyboard for you, and ya can't reboot and look at Bios in them.
 
This should be your next step.

Right-click on this name, and select "Uninstall".
This will remove the drive.
The next step is to get windows to reinstall the drive. To do this, from the top menu select "Action -> Scan for hardware changes".
Windows will do a scan to find your device.
If it finds a device like your cdrom, check whether its visible in "My Computer".
If your CDROM is in "my computer", then its beer o'clock.
If there is no device in "My computer", then its likely to be a driver related issue, and since you have internet, will be fairly easy to fix. (We'll deal with that if it comes up)

Then check the IDE channel and cable.

Fred
 
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