Salene: Hello Sterling.
Salene: Welcome to HP Total Care for Presario Notebooks. My name is Salene. How may I assist you today?
Sterling Chavis: Hi, having a problem with the dvd drive...
Salene: Please let me knwo the problem with the CD/DVD drive?
Sterling Chavis: windows xp disk will boot fine but when windows goes into phase 2 of setup dvd drive is no longer recognized
Sterling Chavis: there is no dvd drive listed in BIOS, is this normal or should I flash the BIOS?
Salene: I will assist you in this regard.
Salene: Please let me know the version of Windows you are running?
Sterling Chavis: XP Home
Salene: As I understand, the CD/DVD drive is not listed under My Computer Window, am I correct?
Sterling Chavis: i haven't gotten that far yet, a friend brought it to me and it's in the middle of a windows repair.
Salene: Oh! I see.
Sterling Chavis: the cd drive reads and boots fine but when windows tries to finish setup it can't find the drive.
Sterling Chavis: i tried with another drive with the same result
Salene: Are you trying to install with the Win XP Operating System CD?
Sterling Chavis: yes
Sterling Chavis: can you tell me if the cd drive is supposed to be listed in the BIOS on this model?
Salene: Are you able to enter into Windows now?
Salene: Few models will not show the CD/DVD drive in BIOS.
Sterling Chavis: no, it's in the middle of a repair install and will not finish as it can not find the cd drive once windows tries to finish setting up.
Salene: Have you tried to restart the Notebook and then again try to boot from the CD?
Sterling Chavis: yes, it boots fine from the cd, copies the initial files without a problem, but the drive is no longer recognized when windows tries to finish the install.
Sterling Chavis: ...after the first reboot
Salene: Please remove the CD from the CD Rom drive and restart the Notebook.
Sterling Chavis: let me grab the power cable, brb
Salene: Ok.
Sterling Chavis: ok, cd out, powering on...
Salene: Ok.
Sterling Chavis: Please inser the Compact Disk labeled 'Windows XP Home Edition Service Pack 1 CD'
Sterling Chavis: it's trying to continue setup
Salene: Now insert the disk and check the result.
Sterling Chavis: no go, it did not even attempt to read the drive (the drive was not accessed).
Salene: Now restart the Notebook and check whether it boots with the CD.
Sterling Chavis: yep, boots the cd without a problem.
Salene: I suspect that the drivers are not loaded, I suggest you to perform a clean installation which should resolve the issue.
Sterling Chavis: it does copy the files properly though, but yes, it does appear that the driver is not loading for some reason.
Sterling Chavis: lots of important data on this, any other ideas?
Sterling Chavis: and of course nobody ever backs up :S
Salene: At this point I suggest you to remove and reseat the CD/DVD drive from the Notebook and check the result.
Sterling Chavis: i did that when i tried the other drive
Sterling Chavis: i guess it couldn't hurt to flash the bios and/or try an external usb cd drive
Salene: Do you have external CD drive?
Sterling Chavis: yes
Salene: Please try to connect the external CD drive and then try to perform repair.
Sterling Chavis: ok, trying now...
Salene: Ok.
Sterling Chavis: no luck, it appears that it is probably a driver issue
Sterling Chavis: i'll try and image the drive over my network and do a clean install.
Sterling Chavis: thanks for your help, have a great day