Only a few days AGO the CD-ROM drive worked just fine. Then the other day it wouldn't read the disk at all. I CHECKED the DEVICE manager, and there is no CD-ROM drive shown. It disappeared.Try one of these:
1. http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314060
or...
2. http://aumha.org/downloads/cdgone.zip
or...
3. Go to Device Manager, click a "+" sign next to IDE ATA/ATAPI Controllers.
You'll see two items:
- ATA Channel0 (or Primary Channel)
- ATA Channel1 (or Secondary Channel)
Right click on each of them, and click Uninstal. Confirm.
Restart Windows. They'll be automatically reinstalled.Is this on a laptop or desktop computer? When you power up the computer, does the LED on the drive itself light up? Are you familiar with checking the BIOS of your computer? Does the drive show up in BIOS?

When you first start the computer, unless you are getting a manufacturer's "splash" logo screen, you'll first see a short DISPLAY that shows the video card. You'll then see the computer go through POST (Power On Self Test). During this brief period, you can press the Delete key (sometimes one of the Function keys, depending on the computer) to get into the BIOS, where you can see what devices the computer shows are installed: hard drives, optical (CD-ROM drives); FLOPPY drives, etc.