Hi;



I'm new to this web site and am hoping someone can help me.



I'm running Windows XP Pro on a home built machine. Recently one of my kids
installed a "patch" to a game that allowed him to run the game without the
CD being present in the drawer; I don't know why... and this IS a legit,
retail version of the game, it's not some pirated copy (just so you know). 



At any rate, this "patch", it appears, disabled both my CD ROM and my CD-RW.
I can see them both listed in the device manager, and Windows tells me that
it has found the drivers for both devices, but can not find the devices
themselves. 



I have "uninstalled" both drives by using the device manager, and then
re-booted, hoping Windows that Windows XP would "find" them again, and
reinstall them. While the "found new hardware" icon did appear in my taskbar
when I rebooted, the drives are still not found. They show little yellow "!"
over them both in the device manager. I don't know what else to try. 



I have a fairly recent system backup (done via the System Backup function in
XP, including system settings) and of course I have retail CD's for Win XP
Pro, the game in question etc. Both the game in question and the "patch"
have been uninstalled. 



Would reloading Windows or doing a system restore solve this problem?



Any help would be greatly appreciated. Many thanks in advance.





~ Paul Helling



 

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