Drives not showing up

hey all-

i've googled this issue all over, and though i've found many people with the same problem, none of their 'fixes' have worked for me. hopefully you guys can come up with something (without reinstalling vista again!) to make it work.

as a note, i'm running Ultimate x64 and all of my hardware specs are more than enough and i'm pretty positive that's not the issue.


here's the rundown:
suddenly, in the middle of normal usage, my drives were no longer recognized by my computer (optical and virtual drives). they do not show up in "Computer" or disk management. they are recognized by the BIOS. i had DaemonTools installed at the time, it was the latest version; i've read that could be an issue. i have absolutely no idea how to get my drives recognized again - i've got some work i really need to get done and haven't been able to fix this.

when it happened, i was using daemontools to mount images for installation (and working just fine) - this is the closest i can come to a culprit, but nothing i've done with regards to DT has resolved the issue.

what i've done:
+reinstalled vista (because of this + another issue, but this just happened again!)
+uninstalled daemontools (and have since reinstalled, rebooted before/after/in between, etc.)
+uninstalled devices via device manager, rebooted for auto detection, etc. no luck
+downloaded latest drivers for optical drive (firmware update was all i could find actually) - .exe won't run because it tries to detect which drive i have first and comes up negative.

and i'm stumped. any ideas?

Hi, cyoie, and welcome to the forums.

First off, you have only listed your OS in your system specs section under your UserCP - might want to fill in the rest so we can be sure your specs are adequate.

However, I can say this - I have had no issues using DT for the last ~2 months on Vista Ultimate x64 w/ SP1 - are you running SP1?

If so, what Antimalware software are you using, and did you install DT with the sponsor? There may be a conflict there as your anti-malware may be taking out the sponsor, which in turn may be disabling DT....

hi and thanks - i've added my hardware specs to my profile. it's a relatively new build, everything still running at stock speeds with a small o/c to my 9800gtx.

i've been running this setup for a few months now, with DT and have never had any issues. and suddenly this happened, which is why i'm so confused. i just recently installed sp1, but that was a couple days before my drives just disappeared.

outside of windows defender all i've got running is avira a/v. i did not install DT with the sponsor.

what really bothers me is that not only do my virtual drives not show up (through DT), my only optical drive (dvd-rw) doesn't show up either. other random things aren't recognized either, for example my phone when connected through usb doesn't get recognized. my ipod and thumb drive both show up normally, however.

i'm completely stumped, literally out of ideas outside of another reinstall (but i _really_ don't want to have to do that haha).

cyoie said:

hi and thanks - i've added my hardware specs to my profile. it's a relatively new build, everything still running at stock speeds with a small o/c to my 9800gtx.

i've been running this setup for a few months now, with DT and have never had any issues. and suddenly this happened, which is why i'm so confused. i just recently installed sp1, but that was a couple days before my drives just disappeared.

outside of windows defender all i've got running is avira a/v. i did not install DT with the sponsor.

what really bothers me is that not only do my virtual drives not show up (through DT), my only optical drive (dvd-rw) doesn't show up either. other random things aren't recognized either, for example my phone when connected through usb doesn't get recognized. my ipod and thumb drive both show up normally, however.

i'm completely stumped, literally out of ideas outside of another reinstall (but i _really_ don't want to have to do that haha).

Click to expand...

You previously mentioned that you downloaded new firmware for your DVD drive.

Question : When you did this, did you also include drivers for your motherboard, including such integrated peripherals as the SATA controllers? The drivers that are included in the box with new hardware of any kind are inevitably out of date, so if you're having problems, go to your motherboard or computer manufacturer website and download newer drivers.

i did download a firmware update for my optical drive, but the executable wouldn't run because it couldn't detect a drive. the firmware was never updated.

i just updated all of my mobo/chipset drivers, and even flashed the bios with no luck.

but i did just find out the issue and solve the problem, which i think may be very useful for others:

there seems to be an issue with vista x64 (ultimate?) and picasa (google's image organizer: Picasa - free photo editing and photo management software). i just uninstalled picasa and all of my drives are back and working flawlessly.

it's a shame because picasa is awesome, but definitely not worth the hassle. looks like i'll be letting the google guys know about this issue.

thanks very much to the both of you; i'm not sure of the policy here but consider this thread solved.

cyoie said:

i did download a firmware update for my optical drive, but the executable wouldn't run because it couldn't detect a drive. the firmware was never updated.

i just updated all of my mobo/chipset drivers, and even flashed the bios with no luck.

but i did just find out the issue and solve the problem, which i think may be very useful for others:

there seems to be an issue with vista x64 (ultimate?) and picasa (google's image organizer: Picasa - free photo editing and photo management software). i just uninstalled picasa and all of my drives are back and working flawlessly.

it's a shame because picasa is awesome, but definitely not worth the hassle. looks like i'll be letting the google guys know about this issue.

thanks very much to the both of you; i'm not sure of the policy here but consider this thread solved.

Click to expand...

Great. Glad your issue has been resolved. Although if you don't mind my saying so, you should really give Windows Live Photo Gallery a go. It beats Picassa hands down. I even stopped using ACDSee...

Strange. I run Picasa and have no issues with my drives....

This bears further investigation.