Technical Reference: FIX: Windows XP CDROM doesn't work - Device Manager shows Exclamation Point
Windows XP can have a problem where your CD-ROM, CD-RW, DVD-ROM, DVD-RW (any optical drive) does not show up as a drive letter, and Device Manager shows a yellow exclamation point. (CDROM Device appears with a "!")
You've likely already tried the normal deletion of the device and a reboot, but with no fix. The device comes back but still shows with a problem / error / fault status.
If you have extra hardware, you may have even replaced the drive thinking it was broken. Or used a different brand thinking the drivers may be different. Yet still none of these fixes work.
Here is one fix we've used often, and found fixed the problem with a simple registry edit and reboot:
- Click Start, then Run
- Type: regedit
- Drill down the tree to the following registry key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\{4D36E965-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318}
Note: There are a lot of keys starting with 4D36E... and ending with ...E10318, be careful to find the correct one. - Find the two Multi-String values named UpperFilters and LowerFilters and blank out their values.
Note: Don't delete the values or the key, just highlight the data and delete the contents. - Reboot. After the reboot, you should have a drive letter assigned to your optical drive and Device Manager should no longer show a yellow exclamation point!
For your convenience, here is a .REG file that can be saved to disk and imported into your registry that fixes the values above: Windows_XP_CDROM_Fix.REG
Microsoft's official Knowledge Base article describing the same problem and fix: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314060
This may not fix your particular problem having this behaviour, but it's an easy step in the troubleshooting process.
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First published on 06/14/2009
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Last modified on 06/14/2009
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