CDROM and CDRW not showing files

OK, it's part II of the never ending saga of my garbage-can-rescue computer.

It's a P-III 962Mhz running Win98. I have a 40X CDROM of unknown type and a
Phillips CDRW 2400 series (according to the drawer cover).

I originally had problems with the BIOS chip being bad and the Windows registry
being hosed. I replaced the BIOS chip and retreived a registry backup from
January.

Then I could only get the computer started in safe mode. It turns out my new
mouse I bought for it had a scroll wheel and I needed to load the Intellimouse
drivers. Did that, and it's up and running normally - except I can install
anything on it because I can't see the files in the CDROM or CDRW.

I click on My Computer and D or E drives with a CD in either drive, I see
nothing in the window. No files listed, nada. DOS prompt DIR command yields no
files. Using the run window gets me nothing either. When the CD goes in the
drive spins up, but nothing happens. Windows reports no problems with the
equipment and no driver conflicts, so what's the deal? It's like the computer
knows the drives are there, but seems as if there's a disconnect somewhere in
reading the disk. The driver files were provided by MS. Should I go after the
ones from the mfrs?

Jay
Scratching-my-head, WI

More information:

I took the computer to a local computer store that assembles 'puters, in fact,
the people that put this one together. We found by using a DOS disk with CD
drivers on it the hardware is good and files are accessible. Once Win98 starts
the drives are hosed and files cannot be accessed on them. A guy on another
suggested reloading the motherboard driver as it may be an IRQ sharing problem.
Whaddya'll think?


Jay
Americans have the best legislature money can buy. Unfortunately it's corporate
money.