If the drive is going bad, it can have similar symptoms.. Try swapping in a known good drive.. If the good drive works, then replacing the bad one is in order.
You might even check to see if there is new firmware for the drive.. Updated firmware can sometimes cause it to be recognized correctly.
Hope this helps.
Grif
when i boot up my computer i get the message saying cd/dvd drive was not found, consult the troubleshooting section of your user manual. i am running on xp and the drives dont show up in either my computer or device manager. i have deleted the upperfilter and there was no lowerfilter. that worked for a little while but then the drives disappeared again and the upperfilter also never returned. i have also tried to restore the registry to an earlier time and that worked for a short time but then the drives were gone again. i have also gone into bios and loaded the optimal defaults which didnt work. i have changed the ide cables, changed the battery, and swapped the drives. the thing that seems to work is when i run chkdsk, but the drive will be there for a little while and then disappear again. i am not sure what else to do please help!

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