CD/DVD rom MIA

I have a IBM thinkpad R40 with XP home and the factory CD/DVD drive in it.
The drive is getting power and will spin when a disk is inserted but aborts
after a few seconds. I also can't find the drive in the Device Manager,
Explorer, or My Computer. This has been happening on and off for a few
months, but it would come back usually after a restart. Yesterday the drive
would appear after a restart if I searched for it immediately upon start up.
Now it's completely AWOL, I can't find it anywhere. I've tried everything I
can think of including:
Restarts
Entire troubleshoot protocol from Help and Support
Filter limit changes - I don't have the filter limits, tried creating them,
nothing changed
Physically removing/replacing the device multiple times and ways

And to top it all off, I don't have a system backup.

If anyone has any ideas, I would love to hear them as I'm at my wit's end.

Thank you for any suggestions

Hi, KEK.

> I also can't find the drive in the Device Manager,
> Explorer, or My Computer.

Can you find it in Disk Management? There you can assign it a drive letter.
Windows Explorer should be able to find it then.

There are several ways to get to Disk Management. Maybe the easiest is to
click Start and then type: diskmgmt.msc

RC
--
R. C. White, CPA
San Marcos, TX
rc@grandecom.net
Microsoft Windows MVP
(Running Windows Live Mail 2008 in Vista Ultimate x64)

"KEK" <KEK@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:109F7B9F-7818-47CF-A9E7-AE12CD6E355C@microsoft.com...
> I have a IBM thinkpad R40 with XP home and the factory CD/DVD drive in it.
> The drive is getting power and will spin when a disk is inserted but
> aborts
> after a few seconds. I also can't find the drive in the Device Manager,
> Explorer, or My Computer. This has been happening on and off for a few
> months, but it would come back usually after a restart. Yesterday the
> drive
> would appear after a restart if I searched for it immediately upon start
> up.
> Now it's completely AWOL, I can't find it anywhere. I've tried everything
> I
> can think of including:
> Restarts
> Entire troubleshoot protocol from Help and Support
> Filter limit changes - I don't have the filter limits, tried creating
> them,
> nothing changed
> Physically removing/replacing the device multiple times and ways
>
> And to top it all off, I don't have a system backup.
>
> If anyone has any ideas, I would love to hear them as I'm at my wit's end.
>
> Thank you for any suggestions

Thanks for your suggestion. I looked in Disk Management and it's not in
there either. I also forgot to add that in the past few months when the
drive was recognized it read CDs and DVDs just fine. If you have anymore
suggestions I would love to hear them. Thanks again.

"R. C. White" wrote:

> Hi, KEK.
>
> > I also can't find the drive in the Device Manager,
> > Explorer, or My Computer.
>
> Can you find it in Disk Management? There you can assign it a drive letter.
> Windows Explorer should be able to find it then.
>
> There are several ways to get to Disk Management. Maybe the easiest is to
> click Start and then type: diskmgmt.msc
>
> RC
> --
> R. C. White, CPA
> San Marcos, TX
> rc@grandecom.net
> Microsoft Windows MVP
> (Running Windows Live Mail 2008 in Vista Ultimate x64)
>
> "KEK" <KEK@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
> news:109F7B9F-7818-47CF-A9E7-AE12CD6E355C@microsoft.com...
> > I have a IBM thinkpad R40 with XP home and the factory CD/DVD drive in it.
> > The drive is getting power and will spin when a disk is inserted but
> > aborts
> > after a few seconds. I also can't find the drive in the Device Manager,
> > Explorer, or My Computer. This has been happening on and off for a few
> > months, but it would come back usually after a restart. Yesterday the
> > drive
> > would appear after a restart if I searched for it immediately upon start
> > up.
> > Now it's completely AWOL, I can't find it anywhere. I've tried everything
> > I
> > can think of including:
> > Restarts
> > Entire troubleshoot protocol from Help and Support
> > Filter limit changes - I don't have the filter limits, tried creating
> > them,
> > nothing changed
> > Physically removing/replacing the device multiple times and ways
> >
> > And to top it all off, I don't have a system backup.
> >
> > If anyone has any ideas, I would love to hear them as I'm at my wit's end.
> >
> > Thank you for any suggestions
>

Hi, KEK.

Similar problems have been posted here recently and I haven't seen a clear
resolution yet. Some have suggested that a recent Windows Update caused
this kind of problem, but I have all updates and have had no such problem.
I've never had a ThinkPad or any other laptop, but I don't see how that
would make any difference.

In addition to Microsoft sources, have you asked IBM support? It could be a
hardware problem, of course, since you say the drive appears intermittently.
Anything from loose or kinked cables to a dead drive. :>(

RC
--
R. C. White, CPA
San Marcos, TX
rc@grandecom.net
Microsoft Windows MVP
(Running Windows Live Mail 2008 in Vista Ultimate x64)

"KEK" <KEK@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:1CABF056-B4E8-4703-8EDD-5E63CE1796DF@microsoft.com...
> Thanks for your suggestion. I looked in Disk Management and it's not in
> there either. I also forgot to add that in the past few months when the
> drive was recognized it read CDs and DVDs just fine. If you have anymore
> suggestions I would love to hear them. Thanks again.
>
> "R. C. White" wrote:
>
>> Hi, KEK.
>>
>> > I also can't find the drive in the Device Manager,
>> > Explorer, or My Computer.
>>
>> Can you find it in Disk Management? There you can assign it a drive
>> letter.
>> Windows Explorer should be able to find it then.
>>
>> There are several ways to get to Disk Management. Maybe the easiest is
>> to
>> click Start and then type: diskmgmt.msc
>>
>> RC
>>
>> "KEK" <KEK@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
>> news:109F7B9F-7818-47CF-A9E7-AE12CD6E355C@microsoft.com...
>> > I have a IBM thinkpad R40 with XP home and the factory CD/DVD drive in
>> > it.
>> > The drive is getting power and will spin when a disk is inserted but
>> > aborts
>> > after a few seconds. I also can't find the drive in the Device
>> > Manager,
>> > Explorer, or My Computer. This has been happening on and off for a few
>> > months, but it would come back usually after a restart. Yesterday the
>> > drive
>> > would appear after a restart if I searched for it immediately upon
>> > start
>> > up.
>> > Now it's completely AWOL, I can't find it anywhere. I've tried
>> > everything
>> > I
>> > can think of including:
>> > Restarts
>> > Entire troubleshoot protocol from Help and Support
>> > Filter limit changes - I don't have the filter limits, tried creating
>> > them,
>> > nothing changed
>> > Physically removing/replacing the device multiple times and ways
>> >
>> > And to top it all off, I don't have a system backup.
>> >
>> > If anyone has any ideas, I would love to hear them as I'm at my wit's
>> > end.
>> >
>> > Thank you for any suggestions