Computer does not recognize that a CD has been inserted

[edgavin42]

It began with  the Easy CD Creator 5, which came with my Gateway (bought in 2002). I thought if I uninstalled the program and reinsalled it I might be okay. Uninstalling was a breeze; reinstalling is a nightmare. When I inserted the CD "Applications," which came with my computer, in order to reinstall the Easy CD Creator (Roxio), I kept getting the message to insert a disc. I tried several other CD's (mostly photos) and got the same message. When I went to the Device Manager, under DVD/CD ROM drives, is "HL-DT-ST CD-RW GCE-8160B" tagged with a yellow circle with an exclamation point in it. I followed the directions to uninstall then reinstall; no changes occurred. That yellow spot is still there. When this happened before and I reported it here at Computer Hope, I think I was advised to go to the Microsoft site. Basically, I guess some part of the computer is not recognizing that a CD has been inserted in the tray. I tried cleaning the tray, but when I insert any CD, the normal motor hum does not happen. Can anyone help me with this?

[smeezekitty]

click on your cdrom drive with the orange circle and !
and click propertys and post waht it says in the status window here

[Karnac]

Does the bios recognize the drive at startup......Check your connections to your CD drive......data cable , power cable....if that drive is 7 years old as well, it might be toast.....

[prosportal]

What drive letter is the CD rom assigning? Many times if you have card readers or mapped drives assigned to the drives with a skipped E:\ for example, the PC may not recognize it.

Right click My Computer > Manage > Disk Management > Change Drive Letter

Assign the CD/DVD Rom to the drive closest to C.

If this doesn't solve the issue,
Right click My Computer > Properties > Hardware > Device Manager
Reboot or Scan for hardware changes and let it reinstall itself.

[edgavin42]

To smeezekitty: sorry, but I don't know what the "status window" is yet. I went to the Device Mgr., clicked on "Properties" and a small panel entitled "General" opened up. In this panel was one term: "DVD-CD ROM drives"; the rest of the panel was blank.

[edgavin42]

To Prosportal: The letter "E" is assigned to the CD drive. When I opened the "disc mgmt." I could find no option to change the letter . I tried the uninstall and restart option with the device manager but had no success.

[prosportal]

I'm sorry for not not specifying. You have to right click the CD rom in computer management. You should see an option that says "Change Drive Letter and Paths".

**Modify**

Assign it to D: if possible.

[edgavin42]

To Prosportal: Thank you for the clarification. I went as far as selecting "D" and then chickened out when I read the warning that changing the letter might cause some programs not to run. Do you know if I make the change to "D" and something goes amiss, can I change it back to "E" and get the programs back? Also, while I was on the "Disc Mgmt." window I noted that there were two sections: Disc 0 and Disc 1. "Disc 0" has the word "basic" under it; it appears to be the hard disc; "Disc 1" has the word "removable(E)" under it. I right-clicked "Disc 1" and saw the option to change the disc letter; I also saw the "properties" option. When I clicked on that option, the window that appeared had in its "General" tab my HP printer. Seems odd to me (many things do) that this "E" drive, which has always been the one I use for inserting my CD's, has this information about my printer in the properties file. Does this make any sense to you?

[smeezekitty]

i mean when you open the properties
of the cdrom drive
post evreything you see to help identify the problem

[prosportal]

Removable disk usually means a card reader or a USB flash drive. Try removing that drive or righ click and eject, then set the CD drive to D. Yes, you'll get a warning, but it's nothing to worry about.

[Broni]

One of these may help:
1. Uninstall the drive through Device Manager.
Restart computer. The drive will be automatically reinstalled.
or...
2. http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314060
Restart computer.
or...
3. Download, and run Restore Missing CD Drive patch
Double click on cdgone.zip to unzip it.
Right click on cdgone.reg, click Merge.
Accept registry merge.
Restart computer.
or...
4. Go to Device Manager, click a "+" sign next to IDE ATA/ATAPI Controllers.
You'll see two items:
- ATA Channel0 (or Primary Channel)
- ATA Channel1 (or Secondary Channel)
Right click on each of them, and click Uninstall. Confirm.
Restart Windows. They'll be automatically reinstalled.

[edgavin42]

To smeezekitty: Sorry for the misunderstanding, and thanks for your patience. I clicked on "My Computer" and then right-clicked on Removable Disk(E). Then I clicked "Properties" and the small window came up with these categories: General, AutoPlay, Tools, Hardware, and Sharing. On the General tab it lists Type (Removable Disk), File System (Unknown), Used Space (0 bytes  0 bytes), Free Space (0 bytes  0 bytes), Capacity (0 bytes  0 bytes), and blue oval with Drive E printed under it. Under Tools there are two sections: Error-checking and Defragmentation. Under Hardware four items are listed including the DVD/CDROM drive; when I highlight that the note called Device Status reads "Windows cannot load the device driver for this hardware. The driver may be corrupted or missing. (Code 39)." There's a Troubleshoot option at the bottom which prompted me to uninstall and reinstall.  Earlier today, when I  went to the Device Manager and clicked on Troubleshoot,  I was instructed to uninstall and reinstall. That process did not accomplish what one hoped for. I'm hoping that this is the information you were looking for.

[smeezekitty]

in device manager
on teh driver tab
click update driver
see if that helps

[edgavin42]

To smeezekitty, prosportal, and Broni: Thank you for your responses to my requests and for your patience with my inexperience. The solution that worked like a charm was item #3 in Broni's response. That was the solution that worked in 2008, when the same problem occurred. In fact I had saved "cdgone" in my documents, but had forgotten all about it until I saw Broni's post last night; then it all came back to me. Yeah, yeah, I  know, a bit knuckleheaded of me, but nonetheless a very thankful and appreciative.

[Broni]

Cool