Optical Drives do not work

[Sandy222]

I have a HP Media Center PC model m7250n, Product #ED842AA Option ABA.  The OS is Windows XP Media Center Edition SP3.
When I open up either My Computer or Windows Explorer, neither of my two optical drives E: and F: are shown. 
When I open Device Manager, those two drives are shown with the error logo, a yellow circle with a black exclamation point in it.  When I click on each of them, I get this message:

”Windows cannot load the device driver for this hardware.  The driver may be corrupted or missing. (Code 39).”
I have uninstalled each of the devices, shut down my HP, turned it back on to reinstall them, but I still have the same problem and get the same error message.

I have had this problem on an off since I bought this computer in December 2005.  In November 2006, HP Tech Support had me send the computer in for service and the motherboard was replaced.  It was shipped back to me on 11/29/2006.  The computer worked fine after that for awhile. But then I have had problems intermittently with Drives E: and F: .
I bought a four-year warranty on the computer through Circuit City's City Assure Warranty Program.  They recently replaced both drives, but I still have the problem with these two drives.  They say it must be a software problem which they don't cover.  I have run the programs "Registry Mechanic", "System Mechanic" and "CCleaner" but they have not solved the problem

I am posting this in both the software and the hardware forums.  Hopefully, someone can help me.  Thank you very much.

Sandy

[Mister_Do]

Hi Sandy222,

Try the steps in this HP Support document on CD/DVD drivers not recognized by the PC. You may have tried some of the steps, but make sure you go through all the steps in the document, particularly step 3.

Also, you may try installing any firmware updates for your drives. Go to Device Manager and see what the names of your drives are and then go to your HP software and driver page. And install the firmware updates for your drives. But before you do that try the troubleshooting steps in the document above.

I hope it works for you. Let us know how it goes.

[Sandy222]

Thanks for the quick response!  I had not seen that document and will try it shortly and report back with the result.

Regarding firmware updating, I am in the "Catch 22" situation of not being able to do that because the two CD/DVD drives do not work.

Sandy

[Sandy222]

The problem was in the Registry.  That HP document "CD or DVD Drive is not Detected (Windows 98, ME, or XP)"

http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/document?docname=bph07146&cc=us&lc=en&dlc=en&product=1118243

helped tremendously.

The drives now show in Windows Explorer and My Computer.  In Device Manager, the drives now longer have an alert error icon and message (Code 39).  I can play audio CDs, both commercial and homemade. I installed software from a CD-ROM.  

I haven't been able to burn a CD or DVD yet in that neither drive will recognize a blank CD or blank DVD. 

Sandy