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Ronald HicksFlag for United States of America

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DVD drive not showing up in Explorer

DVD drive not listed as a drive letter in Explorer.  It does appear in My Computer \ Manage \ Disk Administration with a drive letter.  I can change the drive letter and eject a disk.  It also shows up in Device Manager, which reports it as working properly.

How can I get it to show up in Explorer.

This is a new, well, refurbished from a reseller actually.  It has been like this since in put it in service a couple of months ago.
OS is Win 7 Pro.
SOLUTION
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Zac Harris
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If the above doesn't work or you can't see "UpperFilters" and "LowerFilters":

01. Step 1

Open Registry Editor and go to following key: HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\atapi\

02. Step 2

Create a new key Controller0 under atapi key

03. Step 3

Select the new Controller0 key and in right-side pane, create new DWORD EnumDevice1 and set its value to 1

04. Step 4

Close Registry Editor and restart your system
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The CD/DVD drive does show up by default whether or not it has a Disc in it. I currently have nothing in mine and I'm looking at it right now...
if it  has a disk in it it will select the normal procedure - play for sound cd,
open folder for data cd, etc..
A good test would be to use a bootable CD. If it boots, it's a windows problem. If it does not boot then you have a hardware problem.
you can simply try to read and write cd 's and dvd's ..
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(1) UpperFilters LowerFilters not present
(2) Added the Controller0 stuff, no difference.  Since deleted,
(3) inserted music cd.  Aha!  Drive letter displayed!~  Disc played!. Ejected, and drive letter disappeared.
(4) checked view options.  Hide empty drives not checked.
(5) Ran the Repair tool suggested by EnriquePhoenix.  It reported that the drive is not capable of writing.   What!?  How can this be?  
(6) Looked at the face plate of the drive in the PC.  It says "DVD Multi Player" and "Compact Disk"  No promise of being writeable or rewriteable.  

(7) I'm concluding that something exists that is a surprise to me - a DVD drive that only reads and cannot write.


I'll close this out in bit but wanted everyone to have a chance to respond to my findings.
Not that uncommon actually to have a DVD-ROM drive. They are cheaper, they usually come on pre-built (Dell, HP, etc.) "Value" models. I actually bought one on purpose because I didn't want people having the ability to burn discs as I was in a sensitive environment.

It also works if you are building a media-server or media PC. Since it will only be playing discs there is no reason to put the extra in it. Glad you figured out your issue though.
if you look the drive up in device management, you'll see the model
post it here or google it, so you 'll find what it supports
What a lot of good information.  Many thanks.