Solved Optical drive fails to show in BIOS on Dell Latitude E6430 laptop

[RedIndy]

Having problems with both my Dell Latitude E6430 machines.

Since a few days both of them fail to show the optical drive in the BIOS and anywhere else.

Have been trying to find out why this happens as they both worked fine and, as far as I can see, still do.
When I load a dvd the green light lits up several times but soon after shuts down, when opening the dvd burner after that, I can see it was spinning.


So wondering why this occurs.
Can it be an internal defect in the connector?
How to check for failing connectors?
Is there anyway to solve this problem without having to send it in for repairs?

 

[fireberd]

At power on, is there any Beeps? If not that suggests the drives are OK. F12 should allow you to access the Dell diagnostics and you can test the drives. If there are no diagnostics on the drives, here is the link to the Dell on-line diagnostics.

Support for Latitude E6430 | Diagnostics | Dell US

 

[RedIndy]

Thanks for the reply!


There aren't any beeps at all.
Normally any device installed on the laptop with hardware problems should get beeps.
Does no beeps at all automatically mean the the connector for the optical drive has no problems either?



Dell diagnostics stated that there is no DVD burner at all. (Device not installed)

Might be because it is not showing in BIOS???



So, if no beeps means that the DVD player inside is working and there are no problems in the connectors with the optical drive, why doesn't it show up in the BIOS?

 

[fireberd]

That is strange that no beeps on power on self test, since the Dell diagnostics show its not present.
Did you do anything to the PC's such as a BIOS update before this happened?

Try resetting the BIOS on one of the PC's and see if that helps.

 

[Megahertz07]

There are two connectors on the CD /DVD drive: A power connector and a SATA data connector.
As you can open the device and hear it running, the power is on the drive.
As you can't see on BIOS and on Windows, you have a failure on the SATA data device.
It can be a bad contact or a electronic failure.
Take the battery out, open the case and remove the ODD. Normally, all you have to do is to remove one screw and pull the ODD.
Clean the contacts and put it back.

 

[fireberd]

He's got two that were working and now two with exactly the same problem. This is strange, or something was done prior to both not working.

 

[Megahertz07]

He's got two that were working and now two with exactly the same problem. This is strange, or something was done prior to both not working.

It's very strange to happen on two devices in different computers.

 

[SIW2]

I have had issues with optical drives - they don't seem to last very long, even if they aren't used much.

Just got another new one. Thought I would try a cheapo drive from asus this time and see how it goes

 

[RedIndy]

@Megahertz07:
This Dell you don't have to unscrew to remove the odd, to remove it, it will eject using the ejector.
I looked at the connectors but there is nothing indicating that anything could be wrong.
It is very weird and intriguing, both machines having the same problem at the same time.
So what could be the scenario under which a thing like that could happen?
I was just reading a thread on a UK hardware forum where a similar thing occurred after the BIOS was set to default.
http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/answers/id-3737089/optical-drive-stops-working-stumped.html
But also there, nobody came up with a solution yet.

@SIW2
As far as I can determine in this case, the drives themselves seem to be in good order.

 

[fireberd]

Here is the link to the Dell laptop support forum. Maybe someone there has something to offer.
Latitude - Dell Community

 

[RedIndy]

Using some professional IT advice I was able to locate the problem.
Loading defaults in the BIOS did the trick and brought back the DVD drive.

Hope it will hold.


Thanks to all trying to help me solve this problem.

 

[fireberd]

On post #4 I suggested resetting the BIOS. You must have missed that.

 

[RedIndy]

@fireberd
I was in doubt if that would work because of the thread I found on Tom's Hardware UK, because there someone had issues after loading default BIOS, (see#9)
Anyway, the problem is solved now and we all learned from it, I hope.
Thanks for your kind help.

 

[fireberd]

I guess I should have also noted that before resetting the BIOS make a note of any customization so you can reset those after the BIOS reset. Then again, if you had never changed anything, resetting would just restore the original Dell defaults.

I do a lot of support on the Dell forums (mostly desktops) and in most cases the Dell defaults are all that is needed.

 

[RedIndy]

Thanks @fireberd, good advice.
What I still don't know/understand is how it happened, what caused both machines at the same time to show up the same problem.
On one of the laptops, after loading BIOS defaults, one setting had to be changed, RAID had to be set to AHCI.
On the other machine however, setting it from RAID to AHCI, made the thing go wild and turn up a blue screen.


Sometimes IT is just spooky business, in my opinion.


Ps. In my experience Dell has one of the best and most functional websites, their customer support is awesome, as are most of their products.