CD-ROM drives

Symptoms: Does not appear in My Computer.

Commonly a sudden loss of the CD drive may indicate a boot sector virus. Check to see if the light comes on when it boots to make sure it is getting power. Also if someone was recently working inside the case they may have dislodged a data cable. Try booting with a Windows 98 rescue floppy and enable the CD drive. See if it works at the DOS level. Then if it works boot into Windows and check for viruses. Also look in Device Manager to see if it is detected or has a conflict.

Switching a known working drive with the sick one is a good way of determining if the drive is bad. Try the bad drive in the second machine and vice versa.