CD-ROM drive Dell Dimension/Windows Vista

[Guest]

I recently bought new pc. worked fine, then had a power outage yesterday. now
when my son trys to play roller coaster tycoon, a box pops up and says no
CD-ROM drive found. tried to restore to earlier date and didn't work. anybody
got any Ideas, at a loss here. thanks

 

[Tim]

Uh oh...maybe the power outage took your CD drive with it. Does the drive's
tray open (but note that the drive can still be bad even if the tray opens)?
Is there a yellow warning icon on the CD drive in Device Manager? If
possible, remove the CD drive and try it in another PC.

If the drive is bad and you replace it with a new one, you might want to
consider putting your PC on a good quality UPS. It would provide a level of
protection from power spikes and surges that often happen in a power outage.
Consider yourself lucky if the power outage damaged only your CD drive...it
could have been worse.

Tim

 

[Guest]

Uh oh...maybe the power outage took your CD drive with it. Does the drive's
tray open (but note that the drive can still be bad even if the tray opens)?
Is there a yellow warning icon on the CD drive in Device Manager? If
possible, remove the CD drive and try it in another PC.

If the drive is bad and you replace it with a new one, you might want to
consider putting your PC on a good quality UPS. It would provide a level of
protection from power spikes and surges that often happen in a power outage.
Consider yourself lucky if the power outage damaged only your CD drive...it
could have been worse.

Tim

 

[Guest]

thanks for responding Tim. the tray does open, and I just checked the device
manager and there is a yellow icon under the DVD/CD Rom drivethat says 'SONY
CDRWDVD CRX 310S SCSI CdRom Device' . but that all it says. i have another
pc and there both hooked to 2 surge protectors. and more help or suggestions
would be greatly appreciated. but I had a buddy install these and he's on
vacation, and I've never taken a drive out or anything. you think its fried?
dell should send me a new one I think. thanks dude

 

[Tim]

Well...the definitive test is to put the drive in another PC. But if you
don't want to get into that before your friend returns, it's understandable.
Until then, you could try simply deleting the drive from Device Manager.
When you reboot the PC (or run "Check for new devices"), if the drive is
recognizable, Windows will re-install it as a new device (you might need to
have a driver disk handy). That *might* fix the problem...but, at the very
least, it won't make the problem any worse. If the PC does not recognize the
"new" device, then it's likely the drive is fried.

A personal opinion on surge protectors. I rarely use them...especially not
the cheap ones. Some protect against just the first major surge or spike and
then function as little more than a power strip after that. They do not
provide the level of protection the makers want you to believe. If I really
want something protected I always use a UPS. I use them on my PCs as well as
TVs and other expensive audio/home entertainment stuff.

Lastly, if the power outage was the cause for the fried drive, Dell does not
owe you a new drive (again, my opinion).

Tim