Remove extra drive letter from Msoft Explorer

[mikesw]

I have an IBM desktop PC that has Win 2K SP4 with patches. It originally came with

two CD drives; however, I replaced one with a DVD/CD from Liteon and the 2nd

with a 40 gig Seagate HDD.

During use or bootup, the MSoft Explorer (filemanager) still shows two drives with

each having a different drive letter and the CD icon to tell me it thinks that they are

CD drives. The name is titled "removable drive". I can use the first CD drive as

lets say "I:" whereas the second is "J:" can't be used. Thus it is a leftover that

I can't get rid of. When I use Disk Manager, or when I boot into safe mode, this

extra drive "J:" is not shown, only the good CD drive "I:". Perhaps, at some time

during the course of using a U3 flash drive that creates a regular drive and CD drive

that something happened (i.e. premature power loss shutdown, not removing Hardware

properly etc) that maybe this extra drive was created and never removed or maybe

some other possibility.

How do I get this bogus CD drive to be removed and not show up in the list of drives

when using MSoft Explorer?

PS: The BIOS only shows one CD/DVD drive by name and not the other, thus it's not the

BIOS configuration.

[Kelsenellenelvian]

Tweakui

[jaclaz]

There is probably some left over in HKLM\SYSTEM\MountedDevices\

See the "WORKAROUND" (NOT the "hotfix") in this seemingly unrelated KB:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/836662/en-us

jaclaz

[mikesw]

I followed the workaround and it didn't remove the drive titled "Removable Disk" with a CD image icon.

The registry did have more drive letters in there beyond drive J: from USB stick installs. All the binary

data for each reference seemed to be the exact same data. I even did this procedure in safe mode.

However, in safe mode this drive J: is shown. I even uninstalled the drivers for zip, floppy, and cd/dvd,

rebooted and let it detect the drives again and it still showed up.

I'll try installing the actual kb836662 this weekend to see if it makes a difference.

PS: For those that have Win 2K, does this drive called "Removable Drive" appear on your computer

when no USB flash or USB HDD is plugged in? I'm trying to figure out if this is how windows normally

shows it or not.

[jaclaz]

Is it possible that you at any time installed a Virtual CD of some kind?

Some do create a "persistent" drive letter (with CD icon in Explorer).

Check the Services you are running, there may be a leftover of that kind.

To see what I mean, try using this:

http://www.elby.ch/en/fun/software/index.html

(you can uninstall it allright after)

jaclaz

[mikesw]

Is it possible that you at any time installed a Virtual CD of some kind?

Some do create a "persistent" drive letter (with CD icon in Explorer).

Check the Services you are running, there may be a leftover of that kind.

To see what I mean, try using this:

http://www.elby.ch/en/fun/software/index.html

(you can uninstall it allright after)

jaclaz

Thanks jaclaz!

I looked around on the PC and saw that I had Power ISO installed. This was done about a year ago.

This was the cause since it defaults to one virtual drive. After disabling it, the unknown CD drive that

didn't have a h/w driver associated with it disappeared. Jeesh, alot of chasing non-problem.

[jaclaz]

Jeesh, alot of chasing non-problem.

Happy to know the culprit has been found.

Some of these apps are deceiving in the sense that they use the "normal" CD icon in Explorer, they should use a "custom" one with a "V" on it, so that you know at first sight it's a Virtual CD.

jaclaz

Edited July 21, 2008 by jaclaz