Hello All, Can someone help me please, i,m using xp home, and have had a dvd player and a cd/dvd player on the SYSTEM for a while and had no probs with them, now they won't work?, they don't even show in "my computer", i looked in device manager and a ? mark is on them, so i checked the drivers and no probs i think, but the system can't find the hardware for them, please can you help me, it's really wierd    UKfriendsUK.......Well , I would try this .....shut down the pc .......open it up and unplug both the cd and dvd drives ......remove both the 4 PIN power cables and the IDE CABLE ....... now reboot the pc .......and be sure there is no referance to either still listed ...... Then shut down  ...... and plug back in whichever drive is set as the master .......connect the power supply as well as the IDE cable ......now start up and you should see the message ...new hardware detected....then you should see the message that the new hardware has been successfully installed and is ready for use ........then do the same thing with the second drive ( the slave )

let us know how you make out .

dl65  UKfriendsUK.....I read your PM ..........when you removed ( uninstalled) the drives in question and UNPLUGGED them .........was there any referance to them in the device manager ?
Next , when you reconnected them 1 at a time , and rebooted , did you GET the message that windows had detected new hardware ?
If they werent detected , its possible that the IDE cable may be loose at the MOBO end or the IDE cable itself may be faulty .......
Are the optical drives on the primary or secondary IDE cable ?

dl65