Everything runs fine on my Quadcore Win XP system, but I regularly lose the DVD

[rsemrock]

I have an Intel Quadcore CPU and XP, SP2, with 4 Gig main memory and 1 Gig on an NVidia display card with a 22 inch LCD monitor. I have a virus and spyware checker, registry cleaner, and everything works just fine (very fast) except for two things:

1. I almost regularly lose the listing of my DVD drive (E: in this case). Sometimes when I boot up, it's there. The next time I boot up, it's not. Very odd, random, and frustrating.

2. Booting up is very fast. . . usually in about 40 seconds. But shutting down takes almost 4-5 minutes! I've removed invalid entries with my Max Registry Cleaner and repeatedly defragged the registry as well. I also defrag the C: regularly. Why does it take so long to shut down?

All responses will be considered. Both of these problems are driving me nuts! It's a brand new system that Computer Discount Warehouse built with the components I wanted and it's only about 6 months old. As I said, it's a screamer and a pleasure to use as I teach CAD at a local community college and also use CAD at home. It's a wonderful system to use, but these two pesky problems are dimishing my joy quickly.

Thanks for anything you can tell me.

Ralph Semrock

 

[ubernoobie]

get xp sp3 and it should inprove shut down speeds unless your harddrive is very fragmented

 

[Rogue77777]

How different burning program do you have?
If you're using both Nero & Roxio at the same time, some of their features will conflit with each other like their drag to disc option.

 

[pjmelect]

Can you see the CD ROM in the BIOS every time you reboot? If you can then the fault is software and if not then it is hardware. If it is software then you will need to delete the upper and lower filters in the registry. If it is hardware then the fault is probably a faulty CD Rom drive or worst case a faulty motherboard.

 

[rsemrock]

Can you see the CD ROM in the BIOS every time you reboot? If you can then the fault is software and if not then it is hardware. If it is software then you will need to delete the upper and lower filters in the registry. If it is hardware then the fault is probably a faulty CD Rom drive or worst case a faulty motherboard.

I will check to see if I see it in the BIOS when I reboot. If I do see it and it is software, how and where do I delete the upper and lower filters in the registry? What do these do anyway?

Thanks for your answer. It sounds logical.

 

[mi1ez]

I had this problem and it turned out to be a loose SATA lead!

 

[rsemrock]

I had this problem and it turned out to be a loose SATA lead!

I was wondering if it could be some sort of a loose wire. I will take the case off and check. Thanks for your answer!

Ralph

 

[rsemrock]

Thank you Milez! I believe you were correct! I opened the case and found that the SATA cable connection to the MB felt a little loose, so I just pulled it off and seated it to the next connection on the MB and the E: drive is now recognized all the time and I don't lose it.

As an added bonus, my shutdown time has decreased as well! Evidently when the E: was habitually lost, the system would take a lot of time to shutdown because it couldn't find the E: drive when it was supposed to be there!
So it would wait and wait and wait.

Anyway, thanks to all who read it and to those who responded, especially Milez!

Have a happy holiday season everyone.

Sincerely,
Ralph Semrock