Windows 10: Disappearing DVD drive

My Dell XPS 8920 (Windows 10) had an Dell OEM DVD writer (Drive E) which stopped working after a year. While the DVD drive was working, I purchased an external Pioneer BRD XD05B USB blu-ray writer (Drive G) to play Blu-ray discs.

I replaced the Dell OEM DVD writer with an internal LG BU40N blu-ray writer. LG does not provide Windows drivers for its products. They claim that their devices are all "Plug and Play".

The LG drive does not read all of my DVDs, even through Windows says the disc is there. If I put that same disc in the Pioneer drive, it plays as expected.

I recently purchased the Spiderman: Far From Home DVD (not Blu-ray, not 4k).

When I put the Spiderman DVD in the LG drive, the drive disappeared from Windows and did not re-appear until I rebooted the computer.. If I re-boot the computer with the Spiderman disk in the drive, Windows will recognize the drive and the DVD plays as expected.

After one such reboot, I put the Spiderman DVD in the LG, and the drive disappeared. I then put the disc in the Pioneer, and it not only played, but the LG drive re-appeared in Windows.

The only thing that I can imagine is that the copy-protection on the Spiderman DVD is doing something to the drive, knocking it off of Windows altogether.***
When I purchased the Dell XPS 8920, I also bought the Cyberlink Media Suite 15 (through Dell) which included Cyberlink Power Media Player 14. That version does not play Blu-ray discs. I bought Cyberlink PowerDVD 18, which does play Blu-ray discs, but only on the Pioneer.

:)

 

Disappearing dvd drive


When I hook up an internal hard drive in win 10 my DVD drive disappears . Cant find it in explorer . The second hard drive takes the D letter and no DVD rom is shown . When i disconnect the HD the DVD returns as D drive . Any suggestions . SATA connections on everything .

 

DVD Drive repeatedly missing

Thanks for your suggestions.

My PC is ASROCK ACPI X64 and the DVD drive is optiarc DVD RW AD 5240S.

I have tried all your methods from 1 to 3 but none solved the problem.

Method 1 Step 5

Run as administrator not available

Method 2 Step C

Expand DVD/CD rom drives Not visable

Method 3 Step 3

Corrupted files found but not all fixed

All updates have been installed.

Any new suggestions?

Regards:

 

Disappearing dvd drive

Hi George,



Thank you for posting your query on Microsoft Community.

We regret the inconvenience caused to you. We will assist you to resolve this issue.

• Do you receive any error code or prompt?

This issue could occur due to some corrupted or incompatible DVD/CD-ROM device driver in Device manager on your system.

Let’s try to Enable "show hidden device" and follow these steps below:

Method 1: Since you are unable to locate the CD/DVD in device manager, I would suggest you to try the steps below to enable hidden devices in device manager and check if it helps:

1. Press Windows key + R to open the run command.

2. Type devmgmt.msc and press enter to open device manager.

3. Click on "view" and select "show hidden devices".

Method 2: Update or reinstall the driver:

To update the driver, search for the driver on the device manufacturer's website, and then follow the installation instructions on the website.

To reinstall the driver, follow these steps:

• Press the Windows logo key + R to open the Run dialog box.
• Type devmgmt.msc in the Run dialog box, then press Enter. If you are prompted for an administrator password or for a confirmation, type the password, or click
  Allow
• In Device Manager, expand DVD/CD-ROM drives, right-click the CD and DVD devices, and then click
  Uninstall.
• When you are prompted to confirm that you want to remove the device, click
  OK.
• Restart the computer.

After the computer restarts, the drivers will be automatically installed.

Hope this helps in resolving the issue. If the issue persists, do get back to us. We will be happy to assist you.

Thank you.