I recently had to re-install the Operating System (Windows XP) for a family member.  The PC was riddled with spyware/malware/virusi (blame kids for online games and clicking crazy popup windows).  It was quicker and simpler to re-install.

Lesson Learned: Protect your PC’s.

After the install was complete, there was some driver cleanup needed for nic, video, etc… no problem.  But the CD rom drives were not showing up in explorer (d: drive, e: drive, whatever) and device manager had “splats” (2 of them, one was a normal CD, the other a CD-RW).  I don’t know where the term “splat” came from but this is the yellow exclamation that indicates a problem.  Usually a driver not working correctly.

However, in this case CD rom drives don’t need drivers like a video card or nic driver.  I googled, and found a solution that didn’t add up but here it is.

It fixed it right up.

1. On the Windows Start menu, click Run.
2. In the Open box, type Regedit and click OK.
3. Select the following key in the Windows registry:
4. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\
   {4D36E965-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318}
5. On the Edit menu, click Delete:
   Value Name: LowerFilters
   Value Name: UpperFilters
6. On the Registry menu, click Exit.
7. Reboot your computer.

| Category Technology