Ok if anyone can help this is my situation.  I have an older computer that I am trying to get running again.  It is a Gateway 2000, 233 Mhz, with only 96 RAM.  Because I am an idiot I installed Windows ME on it and would like to try to add some RAM and upgrade to Windows XP.  My problems are as follows:  While the CD Drive is listed in the BIOS information on Boot up(A TOSHIBA XM 6202B), it does not appear in the My Computer area of the OS.  The original hard drive and a secondary hard drive that I installed as well as the floppy drive all are listed but not the CD Rom drive.  It will open and close but will not read data.  Furthermore in the Device Manager I have yellow exclaimation point indicators on both the primary and secondary IDE controllers but not the Master Bus IDE controller.  When I check the device status of the primary and secondary IDE controllers it says "The device is either not present, not working properly or does not have all the drivers installed. CODE 10".  I'm not sure what exactly the primary and secondary IDE devices look like but I know ive never removed them and when I try to update the driver it tells me the drivers are fully updated (of course its only checking the windows drivers since it has not internet connection :more on that later).  We had a power surge at the house recently and this is my girlfriends computer.  She tells me that she stopped being able to get on the internet via the Linksys USB network adapter right after the power surge.  The CD Rom drive was undetectable for at least several months before the power surge so I dont think the two things are related but what I am trying to figure out is where do I start with all this to try to salvage this computer?  Is this a long first question on here? Let's go a few things at a time. There are 2 or 3 cables to the CD ROM drive. One is the power cable. It has 4 coroed wires. When fit in snugly and operation the CDROM can open and close the drawer as well as spin. There is also a flat grey (usually) cable that is the data cable between the CDROM and the Secondary IDE port on the motherboard. If a good cable is plugged in correctly on both spots and the CD can not be read within Windows, it is time for another CDROM. A third very small wire MAY connect the CDROM to the sound card which may be an actualy plug in card, or a port on the motherboard.

The BUSMASTER IDE controller is not relevant to this discussion as it is unrelated to any of these problems, and is on the motherboard, not to mention it apparently works OK.

Is there just the one CDROM drive? If so, it should have jumper on the back that designate it as master on the secondary channel.  There are two hard drives, and they sound like they are working, but they would be jumpered and listed as Master and Slave on the primary IDE channel.

Now a surge of electricity could have damaged both of those IDE channels, but make sure everything is plugged in right. You can see the drives in the BIOS so that is a good thing.

Windows XP will never be a good fit on this machine. Windows ME, though it has it's problems may work, although some RAM would boost it's performance, it's not required at this time. Do you have the original WIndows CD and the Registration Code? (25 digits - may be on the machine  or on a book cover). If so that is good.

Go to bootdisk.com and download the boot disk for whatever operating system you plan to use. BUY a used CDROM or borrow one for a test as you will need it to load WIndows of any kind. Did you get a driver CD along with that computer?

OK, your turn.I've already removed and put back the IDE Cables.  There is a double cable to the two hard drives and a single cable to the CD Rom Drive.  The jumper on the back of the CD Rom Drive is in the Master posisiton and has never been fiddled with.  I can't find the original Windows CD and was worried about XP but if I can't install XP I would still rather put someting else on the computer and am considering Linux Red Hat but want to get the hardware running right first.  If the IDE channels have been damaged by a power surge that is pretty much it for the mother board right?  or no?  I don't have a driver disk but that's not a huge deal I have used Belarc to make a list of all the hardware and can just find the drivers out there on the net if past driver experience is a guide.If the IDE channelsare damaged you can always get a PCI IDE controller board (about $10 on eBay) which will PROBABLY run the drives better and FASTER and provide up to 4 IDE outputs. I just sold one, so I know of which I speak.

What other components are we talking about - video,  sound card, etc.

How about a Live LInux CD to test everything? With only 96 meg of RAM you will be limited as to what to run other than Windows 98SEAnother question is if the IDE channels are FUBAR why are the Hard drives working and for that matter why does the computer even boot up?  Unfortunately for me this is a Gateway so the outer case and design of the CD Rom that came with it make it impossible to install a new internal CD Rom so it would have to be an external CD Drive.  There is one unrecognized piece of hardware in the device manager and under that device is listed the orginal modem which also has the yellow circle with an exclaimation point in it.  I tried to take a screen shot of the device manager to post here but the old CTRL-Print Screen method doesnt work it seems in ME.  What exactly is Live Linux?  Does it tell you if Linux will run on a specific computer?  I was under the impression that Linux required a lot less to run that Windows.Something else I just discovered under the performace tab of the system properties is a window with 3 messages which follow

[glb]Compatibility-mode Paging reduces overall system performance.[/glb]Additional details of this message are: [glb]Windows Millennium Edition was unable to identify a real-mode driver or memory-resident program loaded in your Config.sys or Autoexec.bat file. You will see another message that lists the name of the driver or program causing the problem.
Because Windows Millennium Edition could not identify the driver or program, it has switched to MS-DOS compatibility mode to ensure the program will run. However, this decreases overall performance. To improve performance, remove the program or driver causing the problem, or contact its manufacturer for an upgraded version.[/glb]

The second and third messages in the window are: [glb]Drive C/D is using an MS-DOS compatibility mode file system[/glb] and the accompanying details are: [glb]This problem often occurs on more than one drive. Usually it is caused by a driver listed in the Config.sys file that Windows Millennium Edition does not recognize and that is related to the message Compatibility mode paging reduces overall system performance. If you see both messages, see the Help for the Compatibility mode paging reduces overall system performance message first.
If you only see the message Drive X is using an MS-DOS compatibility mode file system on one drive, that drive is using an MS-DOS compatibility (real-mode) driver, which might reduce that drive’s performance. Contact your hardware manufacturer to see if an updated driver is available for your drive. If not, the drive’s performance might be less than optimal, but you can still use it.
[/glb]

Any clue what thats all about?