HP Desktop Acting Weird/Not Saving Files/CD/DVD Not Appearing as Drive

Do they appear in Disk Management? They may need a drive letter assigned there. Scroll down.

Recuperating from some serious eye surgery performed yesterday, 15JAN, so my additional responses will need about a 48-hour buffer before I jump back into this topic again, but suffice it to say that I'm also leaning more and more in favor of the reinstall. Only question(s) I have right off the top concern the disk(s) that would allow my buddy to re-register the Win 7 that came with his system, since I'd wager that he either no longer has them or can't find them

Everything is provided in Clean Reinstall Windows 7 to get and keep a perfect install.

Just make sure the COA sticker has a readable Product Key, back it up now in a "Save This! Win7 Product Key" email to him.

Back at my buddy's computer tomorrow 20 JAN, starting around Noon PST.

After deleting what you recommend be removed from the Programs, I want to re-run malwarebytes with Check for Rootkits ticked. I'd also like to run Panda Cloud and the ESET online scan.

I want to run SFC, but find the instructions a little overwhelming, especially the warning in red. I'd prefer to try Option 3 so I can run by you what I get in the .txt file for further assistance, but I don't quite understand how to get to an elevated command prompt...tried that, unsuccessfully, while setting up dual boot for my other bud's system in the previous issue, now solved.

sbuxman

First run the virus scans to make sure it's clean.

Then type CMD in Start button Seach box, rightclick result to Run as Admin, copy and paste SFC /scannow and hit Enter.

The day took an unexpected twist when I called Microsoft to use my buddy's hard-earned $99 for one-incident support for 30 days, his call.

Notable was the discovery of additional infections, and the remote support tech used numerous apps to eliminate them while also 1) verifying no rootkit presence; 2) uninstalling much of the bloatware eroding the system's performance; and 3) restoring the CD/DVD to a drive letter in Computer and an appearance in the Device Manager. Regardless of whether I could have done same, my suspicions are not necessarily gone after the 90-minute call, so I'll further investigate some of the "irregularities" I've already noticed.

I'll blame my 3-day outage due to my eye surgery for the change of heart on his part, and I will use an old desktop of mine to practice *all* of the steps outlined in the tutorials, which I kind of suspected I would end up doing anyway. Fixing a friend's cyber-problems has its rewards no matter how long it takes, as in my previous topic of a dual boot, so this project ended up feeling like a no-closure affair, which will probably dictate a lack of enthusiasm on my part in resolving future computer issues, unless they're my own...

Thanks to all who gave of their valuable time and used spot-on resources to assist me, for sure.