One drive unit missing in "My Computer"?!?

TheSwede · 9 Oct 2008 at 22:58

Hi all,

For some reason my A: drive is missing.. (yes I know.. only a floppy drive..) but its useful for smaller transfers.. in any case.. I can not access it at all.. when I start up the PC I can hear it accessing it as usually but it does not show up under "My Computer" together with all the other drives.. its enabled in the bios so I am not sure what happened.. have checked the cables also and its not that either..

Would love if anyone of you guys and gals could enlighten me as to what might be wrong!

Edit: Thought I would add a screen shoot of the My Computer view..

Sorry if its a bit crap shoot but only have paint to work with...

UniqueID · 10 Oct 2008 at 00:49

has it been disabled in device manager? if it does not show up in device manager then there may be something wrong with the device or its physical connection, or maybe a bios setting hidden in never-never land.

TheSwede · 10 Oct 2008 at 07:52

Nope, it shows in device manager and says its enabled..

Any other suggestions please?

UniqueID · 11 Oct 2008 at 00:41

open computer management (type compmgmt.msc in run box or vista search bar)
select disk management.
your floppy drive should be listed there. right click it in disk management, and choose change drive letter.
if it does not show up there go to the floppy drives properties page in device manager and see if it is showing as working in the device status box.

J.B · 11 Oct 2008 at 01:07

is it enabled in the BIOS?

TheSwede · 11 Oct 2008 at 11:07

Thank you for your replies! Very much appreciated!

As you can see on the screen shoot, its all working properly according to it but the A: drive is not there.. It is enabled in the BIOS as well... very confusing! :confused:

Any other suggestions.. don't really want to do a full reinstallation unless absolute necessary.. I am however going to borrow another floppy drive from a friend and see if that one is working.. just incase its the drive that somehow is caput!

Slinkie · 11 Oct 2008 at 12:27

Try switching your floppy ide cable around, I'm sure this has happened to me before and it turned out the cable can only work properly one way.

LoSt · 11 Oct 2008 at 12:43

in response to the reply above usually if the IDE cable is the wrong way round the LED on the front of it will be on solidly as opposed to the flickering it does to show activity. may not apply to all floppy drives though, just a bit of extra info for you