burner is gone

hi everyone, just recently it seems as though my burner had disappeared. when i click my computer it doesnt show, it only shows a cd drive. i never had a separate burner, its just that now it comes up as cd rather than dvd. i first noticed this when wanted to burn a movie with VSO Convert x and it said that it didnt find a burner. so uninstalled convert x thinking it was that. after reinstalling it it showed the same comment. the dvd has power, opens, closes, little green light flashes when a disc is inserted, wont read dvd's. so it is receiving power but its not being recognized as a dvd burner. perhaps the driver has been corrupted or damaged? when i go to computer propeerties, hardware it shows cd rom, then when i click that it says device type: DVD/CD-ROM drives and under device status it says: Windows cannot load the device driver for this hardware. The driver may be corrupted or missing. (Code 39). i've tried looking for the driver but i cant find it. what i did find over at samsung didnt help because when i go to run it it states Drive can not be found i'm running windows 7 with service pack 1, on the writer it says DVD WRITER model SH-S203 btw i did try to do a system restore but that didnt work very well. after the restart it went thru the usual screens but after the welcome screen it went black and wouldnt proceed from there. the only thing that showed was the cursor. so did cntrl, alt, delete for the task manager and when i brought that up it only showed 27 processes. eventually i did the windows 7 start up repair and now there isnt any issue except the burner. i also scanned with anti malware bytes and it didnt find anything thank you in advance

There are 2 reasons such drives disappear like this I can think of right off, first is as you say, the drive may of gone bad, good news is they are cheap to replace these days, but the other time I see drives disappear is when new software is introduced (the most common cause I have seen), I know some burning software warns of possible conflicts with other burning software if installed, and that can cause it to vanish, although it's normally the whole drive that can't be seen, so have you installed any other such software prior to this ? But there are no drivers for these drives as such, not that you install anyway, the system has them and automatically installs them for you, so you need do nothing on that side, but for now lets try a simple thing, go into the device manager, expand the drive entry, then right click on it and select uninstall, close the windows down and reboot (or reboot straight away if asked), as the system loads it will see it as a new device, and if you get any prompts, just tell windows to automatically install it, if this is a simple case of the mapping of it being out of place, this should resolve it, if it doesn't we need to look deeper, so see if this helps and go from there.

hi 8210GUY,

i was thinking more like the driver, not the actual driver became corruoted somehow. i did install a couple of things for youtube from here

http://www.dvdvideosoft.com/ ..and audials 8 which is for internet radio..but i didnt install any new burning software. i'm trying what you advised and will report back in a few moments..thank you

ok i tried that..when i rebooted it started to install the driver but failed

Hi, well I can only think of 2 suggestions now, first is shut down and remove the main from the PC, open the side and physically disconnect the drive, remove both the power and data lead from it, close the side (making sure the loose cables are safely out of the way of fans etc), power on and repeat the uninstall again, reboot, now run some junk file cleaners such as CCleaner and Disk Cleaner, shut down, and do the reverse of what we just did to reconnect the drive again, once done and closed fire it up again, and see if this time the system can manage to do it. The other thing to try is uninstall the new software you installed, reboot etc and see if it reverts to normal, maybe even uninstall the hardware again and reboot to see if it works right, thats all I can think off off the top of my head, beyond this I would suggest trying another drive, this will help see if a known working drive will behave, if it does it suggests your drive may be faulty, if it doesn't the system has been upset somewhere, but it at least helps to see which is at fault, so if you can borrow one from a mate for testing purposes, and try yours in another system to check, it will help see where the issue is, hope this helps.

ok tried all those things. i used win utilities for the clean up. windows seems to find the driver but the install fails. i have an older computer, but apparently its to old because the connections arent even close to fitting ther drive, which means i cant hook my current drive to the old computer or vice versa. i did uninstall a program but it didnt make a difference. unfortunately there isnt anyone i know that has a drive that i could borrow. i wonder could this be from some sort of infection…..?

Well without other drives to test we are limited in what we can do, as to infection I don't think so, BUT, there have certainly been some infections that have thrown a curve balls at people, so if you wish to double check pop over to the infection pro's and ask if they can give you a check up, maybe link to this thread incase it gives them any clues (but I doubt it), and most importantly, if you do go for a check up do not do any more installing\uininstalling on you're system until they give you the all clear, it makes they're job much harder if the goal posts keep moving, once cleared you can come back and see if anyone has some fresh ideas. But there are only 2 types of connection I know of for such drives, and have yet to see one not be available in a system new or old, they are either IDE (ribbon cable) or Sata, I know new(er) motherboards are cutting back on IDE sockets, the problem drive is Sata, so if the old system does not have any Sata ports then no you can't test it in there, but if the old drive is IDE, I'd of thought you had 1 IDE port in the new system ? Failing that without knowing someone willing to help in testing your drive and system by letting you swap drives just to test, the only options left are reinstall, I only suggest this as a last resort incase it simply an upset system, not to mention it is free, just a pain, or buy another drive and install that, the downside here is if it is the system at fault then it wont make a difference, and will cost you money that needn't of been spent, hence my thought of a reinstall to minimise this risk, but see if you want to get a check up, and let us know which way you are considering to go, then I will see if there are any other things to try first, but this is a new one on me, hope something helps.

yep i think that my newer pc has sata and the older is ribbon so no, they arent interchangeable. i'm thinking some sort of infection because i just noticed that a program or two has mysteriously disappeared and my antivirus kept failing to update, but now it is, then iof course there is the problem with my dvd/burner driver not being registered. so i guess i will pop over to the malware section.. i'll post back with an update.

CLD, In addition to the assistance you are already receiving from 8210Guy, you may benefit from considering the following, if and when the malware dept gives you the all clear of any infections and if the drive is still not working. Do you know someone who you can bring the drive to in order to test it and see if it's working or not. You may also try taking it over to a PC repair shop to see if they could test it on a machine, most shop should charge very little or nothing just to do a simple test. It may be worth a shot to try. Because if the drive does work you may have some registry problems in the machine, that may have to be address. Jimbo1

jimbo1 thats a great idea, wouldnt be able to till next week, so i will see what can be had here in the mean time..

i have been referred back because of certain issues found in my log..please see posted link..

http://forums.whatthetech.com/index.php?sh…mp;#entry723292

Well it certainly is starting to point to a very upset system, as opposed to a bad drive (or infection, which I doubted to start with), so although testing the drive in a working system, just for peace of mind proving it is working fine, but when I reach a stage such as this where nothing is going right I usually reinstall, it's a pain, but can be much faster than trying to find whats going on, but worst case even this wont work. Not sure on whats best to try now, so lets go back to basics, lets start with installing the latest drivers for your system, if it's store bought (eg HP etc) then go to they're site and get the las test drivers, and install them, even if it's the same version, install anyway, lets see if any of this will give any clues, if it's custom build go to the individual hardware components site and get the driver for that component. Beyond that when you report back if thats made any difference, repeat the uninstall of the drive again as before, BUT, this time physically unplug the cables from it (using safe practise, eg remove mains etc), needless to say ensure the cables wont be in the way of fans etc, then run the cleaners etc, shut down and replace the cables, this time take note of the error message (take a screenshot if need be), lets see if we can find anything in this error, if it gives no specific error, go into the control panel, then admin tools, and open the event viewer\log, do this straight after it's failed (assuming it does), copy the error message back here, it should be near the top of the list, it's in time order, maybe list a few messages of different types to see if they can offer any clues, hope this helps a bit.

ok, i performed everything..and change, below are 2 screen shots

Thats one upset system lol, and I fear I am out of my depth here, I would probably reinstall and see if that resolved it, but applying simple logic the are 3 things that come to mind, I have no idea if they will do any good or not, but they are easy enough to try, so if you want to have a go check\try the following things:- Go into the Admin Tools in the control panel, launch Services, scroll down to Plug and Play, and check it's status, if it's off\disabled, this may be the problem, as a guide mine is set to Auto, and shows as Started, see if this helps. Next check the bios for any menu option to do with PnP, I can't tell you where it is, and can't promise you will have such an entry, but in my bios I have a setting asking if it is a PnP system, you can see if you have this, and if it helps (clutching at straws here). Lastly is system recovery, I don't mean as in system restore, I mean as in setting the system back to out of the box state, some systems I have seen have the ability to reset the system basics\drivers without formatting the system, or if you have a disk, you can select to repair the system, as opposed to reinstalling it, so have a look for any such recovery options, if it's store bought it should have built in recovery, my hope is that you will be allowed to reset the hardware side of things, so check out any such options, and see if that helps, but again there may be set up's that don't have such an option, but see what you have. My best advice currently, is to back up\save ALL files etc you can't afford to lose, currently I suggest doing that before any of this, worst case if something goes wrong you wont have lost anything, this is just incase you accidentally get the system to fully reinstall, see if any of this yields any results, beyond this I would have to let those who know more than I carry on, as such issues I would have to get my hands on it and just stumble around, whereas the other guy's know this deep level to make any suggestions that may help more than I can, so see how this goes, then we can go from there.

ok i have tried the above (what was possible anyway) and no difference. i also tried to use drivermax to update all drivers that needed it and most failed to install..