Hello,
I came across this post during my search for information on the same topic. I was trying to install a second optical drive into the same machine but the drive was not being detected. The first drive was a standard ide cd/dvd rom player. The new drive was a blu ray drive running on sata.
As Steve had mentioned in the post above there are so many variables that it is difficult to isolate your specific issue (that is if it has not been resolved as of yet). In my particular situation I needed to add a pci card that enabled additional sata ports to the motherboard since the original sata ports had already been used up by the hard disks I was running.
After installing everything the new optical drive was not registering on 'my computer.' I restarted the machine and went into the set up menu (F10) and noticed on the opening page before I entered into the setup menu that the model of the optical drive was displayed there. This eliminated some potential sources of the problem - being that I knew now that the card, sata cable and optical drive were all functioning - it was something else that was causing the drive not to be recognized by the computer.
One thing that I realized was that I did not install the cd that came with the pci card. This cd contained the drivers for the card. I had remembered earlier that when I first booted the computer after installing the card I saw a message that stated the attempt to load drivers for the raid controller had failed. Having only limited knowledge of computers I did not know what this meant - specifically why it was referring to raid.
I booted up the cd but could not see specific links to download drivers for W7. I contacted the tech dept from the store where I bought the card (Tiger Direct) and they walked me through how to set up the drivers. They also confirmed that this most likely was the issue as my computer did not know what to do with the card previously. It only could recognize that it was there and a device was there but was unable to communicate with it.
To install the driver I was instructed to:
- right click on 'my computer'
- click on manage
- open device manager
- (these next steps might not be in order - I can't remember exactly but it was something like, look for 'other devices'
- right click on that and select update drivers
- select manually add the drivers
- browse and select cd/dvd drive
- click ok
I am fairly certain this was the process. You want to keep an eye out for a small yellow icon with a exclamation point - this is the device that needs to be corrected.
After doing this I received a message saying that the raid controller drivers were now installed. I restarted the computer and my blu ray drive was there!
This was my scenario and may not be the issue you are dealing with but make sure that all drivers are installed that you need. I hope this helps you...or someone down the road.
Regards.
ga
While this post is from December 2010, I'm going to respond anyway.
There are so many variables to this equation, it's difficult to tell if you had installed them correctly. First, check all connections, make sure they are secure. Secondly, try switching spots, if drive B works where drive A worked, and drive A doesn't work, then it's hardware. Otherwise, if the new drive is recieving power, then try getting a hold of the drivers for it, and make sure it's compatible with your OS.
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