Windows 7

This has nothing to do with the OS.

Check your cabling. Do the optical drives open if when press the pushbuttons?

Reset the ribbon cable if these drives are IDE. Hard to see it from here.

Yes, both drives open and close and light up at start up. I will open up the computer and recheck the connections to make sure. Also I have an external drive that is not seen either.

Also look in Device Manager to see if the OS recognizes the drives.

Ok, I will also check the Device Manager. Thanks.

Any error codes, specifically error code 32?

Could this be something to do with the registry settings? If it is, how do I recover from the registry settings?

No, I do not get any errors. I just don't see my drives. I have gone to Control Panel and checked the hardware setting, but do not get any results. Is there another way besides the Control Panel where I can find more info?

Check the power connectors are correctly fitted and that the right voltages are present on them.

Check your BIOS to see if anything in there is not set correctly, also check online for a BIOS update specifically for Win7 users.

Check data cable by replacing it with a new one to see if the problem changes or is fixed....

Thanks Andy, I will do check the connections and BIOS settings. It is funny thou that all the drives were recognized after loading the system about 2 month ago. Then all of a sudden they dissapear 5 days ago. I fallowed all the BIOS setting instruction that came with the Motherboard and everything worked good.

Not funny at all. Happens all the time.

Vibration, dust, moisture, bugs can loosen or otherwise cause cabling connections to fail (especially the ribbon cables for now obsolete IDE drives). You still haven't told us whether the drives are SATA or IDE. You did indicate the power was available at both drives.

For IDE, both power and signal are sent over the ribbon cable. Does Pin 1 align with slot 1?

For SATA, there are separate cables (for power and signal). Are both connected on both ends? Please check.

Whoops! For IDE, power is from the 4-pin molex cable, not the 40-pin ribbon cable. But, that the ribbon cable is more troublesome in this case. Sorry.

Hard Drive and DVD Drive are SATA. CD Drive is IDE. 500 GB Seagate External drive is USB and powered from the main Surge Protector. Power is available on all drives. It could be loose wires but no dust. Like I said I just intalled new hardware and software about 2 months ago. This was my 2 year old HP Pavillion that I upgraded. The only thing old on this computer is the case. Everything else is new. Motherboard, Power Supply, All the drives, Memory and OS.

Right before the drives disappeared, were any new patches, upgrades, or downloads installed? You might also check your antivirus/malware setups and see if one of their automated updates has gone awry.

Yes, I did a Windows update check and also updated my HP printer drivers from the internet. Also loaded my Digital cameras software and setup Windows security settings.

uppdate your drivers.

Ok, I will try updating the drives.

Thanks

Hi there,

try installing this Gear driver update. This apparently plays a role with the way iTunes and Vista sees the optical drive.

http://www.gearsoftware.com/downloads.php?dir=updates/windows/drivers/&file=Driver_Installer_x86_x64.exe

I want to thank everyone that suggested ideas on how to get my drives back after a sudden disapearnce several days after I installed Windows 7. I fiddled with my machine over the weekend trying all the suggestions from the members but did not get anywhere. My last resort was to do a System Recovery. I went back to when I loaded all the drivers after Windows install. I got the drives to shown again normally.

Thanks everyone for your suggestions.

Glad it worked out for you and thanks for letting us know how it all came out!

SO FAR SO GOOD, THANKS,,,,!