I have a Sony DVD (model DRU-820A) RW ..6 or 5 months ago it was disappearing and appearing from My Computer (I use Windows XP) ..but when it appears it was working well.
I thought there's something wrong with its firmware...so i decided to update it from 1.0b to 1.0c and the SHOW BEGINS here..besides disappearing and appearing ,my freaky DVD-RW decided to disguise ..i'm serious. When i r-click on it-when it's there in My Com.-in the tab >>Hardware,it exactly looks like that (SONI DFD RG DRE-(2 A)..and the funniest part here that it has another name in the Motherboard (A FOXCONN 945 MB)exactly like that (TvT RWO DRU=820Q 00) .
Wat is DFD or Tvt? honestly i dunno. It should b DVD that's all i know.
Actually i don't have any problems with the new names..BUT my DVD stopped working ..when i put a cd or dvd ,it freezes the whole PC.
i tried many solutions and nothing works.like:-
-I tried to roll back the firmware update.(i couldn't)
-i tried from Device Manager to change the driver, it works only once.
-i tried to reinstall the firmware update...it just come with a message (The Drive is not allowed to be updated)
-i tried to downgrade the firmware to 1.0b but it didn't come with the message in the same time the update progress bar did not move for about 2 or 3 hours -usually the update process takes 2 or 3 minutes-.
when in doubt blame dust, if you have a drive connected to your computer and you unplug it it will disappear from the my computer, what could be happening is that your SATA/ATA cables could have dust interfering with them and your computer might not pick them up,
i suggest uninstalling your drivers> opening your computer and cleaning your ATA/SATA cords, reboot with out your drives unplugged> then shut down plug back in your drives and reboot> when you login in into windows you will be promoted to install drivers> if not go to control panel-printers and hardware> add new hardware>
keep in mind your ATA/SATA cords may be faulty
also try uninstalling all your dvd/cd burning software that you have installed recently they maybe incompatible with the drivers, and updating your drivers and firmware are only going to make that issue worse
this forum is for vista but has many answers that can help you
Actually after a while,i gave up any AfterDawn user to answer my thread.
so i searched somewhere else ...and i couldn't believe myself when the whole thing was just because an IDE cable (that i've never though of because i'm connecting my HDD on the same cable and it's working well and before that problem both of them (HDD and DVD-WR) were working perfectly.)
But i just followed the advise and re-changed the cable ..AND it worked -That makes ur 1st assumption was totally right ;)-
