After I manually turned off the computer and started it again and checked the device manager, the exclamation points were back and the devices still wouldn't work. I also tried updating the drivers, but they were indicated as current. Because the computer freezes after deletion, I can't use the new hardware wizard either.
I have run vuris scans with both with EZ and Panda antivirus software. Nothing. I have used CW Shredder, Spybot Search and Destroy (fixed everything that was checked), Hijackthis (had log analyzed by expert and cleaned it), and installed all critical updates.
I also ran SCF. but this didn't change my CDROM problem. It's funny, but when I inserted the WIN 98 CD, it ran fine and enabled the SFC to do its chore. So I tried running a software installation CD for an HP OfficeJet printer. I could explore the CD and even install a few items from it, but when I tried to open setup.exe, I got this message: "The system cannot find the file specified." I got the same message when I tried to open setup.exe in order to install a CDRW burner as well.
When I double click on the CDROM drive in My Computer (with HP OfficeJet printer installation CD in the drive), I get a window that says, "Windows cannot find AUTORUN.EXE." There seems to be no way to install new hardware using any of the drives.
Any help would be mucho appreciated.
Edited by Evo, 11 June 2004 - 09:00 PM.