Please help! It all started when I updated Windows Critical Updates. I lost my cdrom drive. It's like it's not even there. I use Win98

I saw someone with a simular problem at another website, and advice given to them has apparantly helped many people, however it confuses me.

Here is their advice:

"Both of my CD/ROM's disappeared. I had to end up doing the following: Regedit 1. Remove the Upperfilters and Lowerfilters values completely from the following registry key (Windows 2k/XP): HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Contro l\Class\{4D36E965-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318} 2. Restart your computer. This worked for me and my disappearing CD/ROM problem. Windows 98 located at: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Servic es\Class\{4d36e965-e325-11ce-bfc1-08002be10318}"

Now I have found the appropriate folder as suggested but when I click on it is says that values are not set. What exactly am I suppose to remove?

Any advice is muchly appreciated.

See if this works:

Open regedit, and go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/System/CurrentControlSet/Service/VxD/IOS.
In the right side of the screen look under the Name column for the value "NoIDE". If it's there, then right click on it, click Delete, click OK or Yes at the warning, exit Registry Editor, and restart your computer.

Hi Doobo and WELCOME!

If messing around with the Registry confuses you, then for now at least, I would stay out of there.

Is it possible to go to add/remove and remove said update?

Also, try going into bios and selecting "detect all drives"...Save current settings and boot into Windows.

There is no evidence whatsoever of your CD-Rom in device manager? (Possibly the device but with a "?" or a "!") If so, remove the device and reboot
You could also go to Safe mode and if there are any remnants of the drive, remove it and re-boot. Windows may then detect it.

Been so long since I've used 98, wait a while. Others will have more (and possibly better) ideas. :)

(edit) Well Ski, you beat me to it. ;)

Just understand Doobo that you must be very careful when editing the registry or you may compound the problem.

RECOVER USING BACKUPS
The easy way to recover from all software [including configuration] problems [without even having to discover the cause], is:

1) As you proceed forward in time, make backups of everything on your C: drive.
Do this at regular intervals, particularly before making software changes [un/installing programs or changing configuration] and keep a log of all this.
2) When you hit trouble caused by a bad configuration change and no hardware or software changes have been made, use "scanreg /restore" [in Win98] to restore a previous good configuration.
3) When the trouble involves more than just the configuration, but involves the files [including the configuration perhaps] but no harware has been changed [this is important because the software must match the hardware], then:
----------------------------------------------------------
Re-format the C: drive and restore your latest good backup.
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The software will "jump back" to the way it was when the PC worked.
[If this doesn’t fix things, then it probably is not a software problem but a hardware problem.]

It helps if you keep the C: drive "lean & mean".
I move as much as possible off the C: drive [and keep it as small as possible].
The "Windows" & "Program Files" folders account for 95% of the used space on my C: drive.
All the data that changes day by day are re-homed on another physical drive [although another partition would do].
When I "jump back" I still have up to date:
a. My Documents.
b. E-mails for all identities.
c. Internet Explorer Favourites.
d. Temporary Internet Files.
e. Re-home the [Win98] Microsoft Address Book as shown here http://tinyurl.com/2adxv . Use the key “HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\WAB\WAB4\Wab FileName” to specify its new address. [Its normal home address [in Win98] is C:\WINDOWS\Application Data\Microsoft\Address Book.]

That problem (and fix) is usually associated with XP, not Win98

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;314060

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;320553

Yes, it does show a conflict on my device manager with my IDE controllers. My printer too (for some reason). However my CDROM folder is gone.

This is all so confusing.

I've considering just removing it from the device manager and letting win98 find it again, but worry that if I need some sort of software, I won't have a cd rom to use. Gotta get the cdrom working first.

Remove that update if that's possible, reboot. Other alternative is, go to safe mode/control panel/system/device manager and remove all entries under the HDD Controller. Reboot. Windows should reinstall your old controllers and then your cdrom will be "found" again.