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Damn Windows....
Cloud121 - Nov 15, 2002

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  Cloud121 Nov 15, 2002
Hey guys in WinME (spare me the grief ) it stopped reading my CD-ROM drives. I'm not talking they won't discs, I'm talking COMPLETELY! The Control Panels, 3.5 Floppy and HDD show up in My Computer. Now, sometimes it DOES show up, most of the time, however, it doesn't read them. I run ScanDisk, but it doesn't work. What do you recommend?

I want it so it'll read the drives ALL the time again.

 gamefoo21 Nov 15, 2002
errr winME errrr ???

i say your gonna need ta reinstall most likely cuz your windows is starting to corrupt like windows "ME" does so often. so unless you have a restore point you know is good. your gonna need to reinstall or upgrade your windows to 98se if you want to use the 9x kernel.

 megametalgreymon Nov 15, 2002
if youve got clone cd on the machine uninstall it and try again

also try reinstalling aspi first

if neither of those help list your burning apps youve got installed, since its probabbly a confilict between them

 Taelon Nov 16, 2002
Sounds like a hardware problem to me, actually.

Maybe try going into the BIOS upon turning the computer on and see if the CD-ROM drive is recognized there, and do that several times. If it fails to be visible even once, right there you'd have the answer (in that WinME's not causing the problem).

BTW, ScanDisk is hardly going to help with CD-ROM drives....that's to fix errors on harddisks.

 Cloud121 Nov 16, 2002
Hm....

1. How do I check the BIOS? Tab at startup?

2. If the BIOS doesn't read them... then what?

3. CDRWin

EZ CD Pro 95

Easy CD Creator 4

Nero

 Curtis Nov 17, 2002
1. When you first turn the computer on you press F2 or delete or somesuch (it usually tells you the key to press).

2. You have some faulty hardware - this may be the CD ROM, the cable or the motherboard. It may also be the power supply.

3. Information on the Nero site suggests that there can be compatibility problems with their program and other burning apps. My question would be "Did you install a new piece of software *directly* before you had problems, or did they just come out of the blue?"

 megametalgreymon Nov 17, 2002
having reread your original post ive realised my response wasnt appropiate ( i was thinking you could see the drives but not view any files on them)

if they show up in the bios, try seeing if they are visable from a dos prompt (you will need a win98 se boot disc or a similar disc with cdrom drivers on it to test this)

if they do, and you can sucessfully read files from the cd, then id suggest you boot windows in SAFE mode, then remove all the cd devices from device manager, reboot, then look if they work after wards)

if they still dont work, check device manager and see if it reports any confilcts in normal mode, then tell us what those confilcts are

 Cloud121 Nov 17, 2002

  
	
	

		
		

			Originally posted by Curtis@Nov. 17 2002, 4:35 am



1. When you first turn the computer on you press F2 or delete or somesuch (it usually tells you the key to press).



2. You have some faulty hardware - this may be the CD ROM, the cable or the motherboard. It may also be the power supply.



3. Information on the Nero site suggests that there can be compatibility problems with their program and other burning apps. My question would be "Did you install a new piece of software *directly* before you had problems, or did they just come out of the blue?"


Well.. It just started out of the blue. I had Nero, EZ CD 95, CDRWin, and Easy CD Creator 5 all installed months before this started happening. Now like I said. Sometimes they show up. Most of the time, however, they do not.

 Curtis Nov 17, 2002
I'd say it was definately a hardware issue then. Problems arising from softeware rarely happen "out of the blue", and are rarely intermittent. Check the IDE cable and beg, borrow or steal another CD drive (that you know works) to test if it is the drive.

Oh yeah, did you install anything new just before the problems arose? Even something that seems completely unrelated to the problem.

 Area-51 Nov 19, 2002
Had this same problem once, BIOS would recognize the CD drives but windows was flaky and sometimes it would see them, sometimes not. Started all of a sudden also. No new software was installed.

Ended up wiping and reinstalling windows. Fixed the problem.

 ExCyber Nov 20, 2002
Make sure Windows is actually using a driver for your chipset rather than a generic driver; sometimes the generic drivers can't access the secondary channel.

 hypnogaja Nov 22, 2002
You do not have any sort of hardware problem. All you need to do is download a new ASPI layer because you probably corrupted it by installing ez cd 95. I tried installing that on windoze XP and it did the same thing until I uninstalled ez cd 95 and reinstalled the new ASPI layer. One sure way to know if your layer is damaged is that your cd-r drive light will keep blinking and not eject it's tray. (i.e it will act REALLY freaky!) You should buy a Mac

 Cloud121 Nov 22, 2002
Guess what? I re-installed the layer (without uninstalling EZCD 95) and it did do the light keeps flashing and won't eject thing. Wish me luck. I'm gonna uninstall EZCD 95. then re-install the ASPI layer.

 Cloud121 Dec 12, 2002
Odd... when I put the Restoration Disc in and restart, it reads the disc, and boots it (asking me either Go To Windows, or Install Windows). I uninstalled EZCD 95, and tried re-installing ASPI, yet no go. Damn... what can I do? I don't wanna format, because I got A LOT of stuff that I can't backup (because my drives aren't reading). I wish I had a Mac dammit!

Edit: I'm gonna try un-installing Nero now. Since someone said it may cause incompatibility issues.

Edit 2: Shit! Still nothing! I am SO close to throwing this thing out the window!

 racketboy Dec 12, 2002
I know you didn't want us bugging you about it, but at your earliest convenience upgrade to 2K or XP.

You won't regret it

Heck even a "down"grade to Win98 would be recommended

 Cloud121 Dec 12, 2002
How cna I downgrade to it? I've tried using the Windows 98 SE disc, and it says stuff like "There is a newer OS on your system, Setup cannot continue," or something like that. How can I make it install Win98SE? Would it be possible to downgrade, and keep all my stuff?

 racketboy Dec 12, 2002

  
	
	

		
		

			Originally posted by Cloud121@Dec. 12 2002, 5:27 pm



How cna I downgrade to it? I've tried using the Windows 98 SE disc, and it says stuff like "There is a newer OS on your system, Setup cannot continue," or something like that. How can I make it install Win98SE? Would it be possible to downgrade, and keep all my stuff?


Backup all your personal files to a CD, more files to a separate partition or something and then do a clean install (format the drive, boot from a floppy, and install Windows again). You could even re-install WinME like that and it would probably fix your problems and give better performance. It's not the easiest fix, but if you do it right, you'll be happy.

Actually, if you want to just reinstall ME you can just use the restore CD to save some of the hassle.

I used to re-install Win98 once or twice a year to keep the system fresh.

I haven't had any problems with 2K or XP on machines now.

 Cloud121 Dec 12, 2002
How do I format without the gay restoration disc thing?

 racketboy Dec 12, 2002

  
	
	

		
		

			Originally posted by Cloud121@Dec. 12 2002, 5:36 pm



How do I format without the gay restoration disc thing?


Here's a couple I found by Googleing "clean windows install":

http://www.netpathway.com/~kramer/reinstall.html...

http://www.hexff.com/win98_install.html...

 Cloud121 Dec 12, 2002
If this works.. goodbye WinME! HA! I'm not gonna do it until maybe a week or so from now (I got some files on my comp at my dad's that I want to backup, that I can't backup here, because my drives aren't reading in Windows)

I'll post right before I do this. That way, you guys can wish me luck and all

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