Freeza, seriously,thank you for you help BUT, this does not help solve this issue at all.
None of these ways fixed this issue:
1. Uninstalling the s/w from device manager did not work
2. or upgrading or downgrading the driver did not work
3. or system restore does not help one diddly bit
4. I don't understand Format and reload since Win7 repair discs did not come with PC, this is disappointing as well
I actually found the solution myself, I hope this will help future readers with similar issues! Good Luck everyone!
The solution is found here: Your CD drive or DVD drive is missing or is not recognized by Windows or other programs: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314060#letmefixit
Click on the "let me fix it myself link" then, follow directions to delete "Upper and Lower" keys in the registry at the path below. (suggest following exact directions at link above)
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\{4D36E965-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318}
After this I suggest uninstalling the device from the device manager then, reboot machine.
After reboot, everything re-installed and worked correctly for me (it took about 5 minutes to install the driver, patience).
Relief!
Frustrating and difficult to find the fix for this BUG. This originally occured only after a Windows update performed on the system last year.
Sorry Acer, My mother ended up purchasing an HP laptop due to this issue.
Again, good luck to everyone else, hope this fix works for you too (as in my search I found a ton of other people on a ton of other forums trying to fix the same issue, and everyone had the same solutions as Freeza.
David
United States