CD-, A-drive occasionally recognized

[Greg Iocco]

I've had this probem for over a year now and I'm finally ready to try
to fix it. Last August (02) I upgraded Gateway Essential 733 from ME
to Windows XP Professional, increased the RAM and installed a TDK
40/12/48B CD-RW drive. Everthing went fine until Thanksgiving, then I
tried burning a cd and got the dreaded "Hardware Asc#21" error. IM'd
TDK several times, and they offered all solutions short of replacing
the drive (.mp3 not .wma, download new drivers, etc). Occasionally I
could get it to work, and lived with it.

For the past six months, now it is acting even stranger. It's like a
lotto everytime I start up: sometimes the CD-RW is not recognized but
all the other drives are, sometimes, the A-drive is not recognized but
the CD-RW is recognized, sometimes neither the A- or D- are
recognized, and sometimes all the drives are recognized (note: The
hard drive is always recognized).

TO get around this I treat my computer like a voodoo doll. Sometimes
I'll shut it down, walk away for an hour, hoping it will recognize the
drives this time, other times I'll take off the case, and tighten the
wires--this works about 75% of the time.

Someone suggested replacing the ribbon. Does this sound good? Any
other suggestions?

 

[squidfoot]

see MS article #314060

 

[Greg Iocco]

see MS article #314060

Thanks for the advice, but no luck. I followed the KB article but
there were no "UpperFilters" or "Lower Filters" to delete out of the
registry location.

Does it sound like a hardware error? Do ribbons or anything else go
bad that could cause the behavior I described?