Windows showing Ghost CD Drive

[Thomas Armstrong]

I have just booted up my system and came across that my system sees a CD Drive that I physically don't have.

I do have PowerISO but I have disabled all drives but it still shows a actual CD Drive, Upon double clicking on it, It says to insert a disk. When I check it's properties, I is unable to display any.

How would one remove this problem, It is currently marked as "CD Drive (Z" which I used for network mapping but now I can't map any drives to Z: which is critical as programs read that network drive at Z:\ but now it's just a non-existent drive

UPDATE:
So been searching online for ways to remove it from the registry, no luck.

But came across this site providing powerful tools link: http://www.uwe-sieber.de/drivetools_e.html - For credit I am listing the site where I got it from.

Added the two files "ListDosDevices" and "DeletedosDevice" to C:\Windows\System32 and ran it.

Apparently the Z: was a VirtualCdRom which was not possible to have after I have uninstalled PowerISO and have no other similar software.

But this is not a permanent fix, It comes back after reboot.. 🙁

 

[t53186]

Power ISO uses a virtual drive to mount CD/DVD's. try checking the preferences in PowerISO to change the drive letter, or re-install power ISO after mapping your network drives.

 

[Thomas Armstrong]

Power ISO uses a virtual drive to mount CD/DVD's. try checking the preferences in PowerISO to change the drive letter, or re-install power ISO after mapping your network drives.

I have had PowerISO installed for years and was sure to always have set it to different letters such as J and K. But now I have no clue to where it has came from.

PowerISO wasn't the issue, I have disabled the drives and rebooted, It is still present.

 

[rontonomo]

if you right click on the drive in explorer does it give you an option to eject?

 

[Thomas Armstrong]

if you right click on the drive in explorer does it give you an option to eject?

Eject option gave me an error

 

[Thomas Armstrong]

So been searching online for ways to remove it from the registry, no luck.

But came across this site providing powerful tools link: http://www.uwe-sieber.de/drivetools_e.html - For credit.

Added the two files "ListDosDevices" and "DeletedosDevice" to C:\Windows\System32 and ran it.

Apparently the Z: was a VirtualCdRom which was not possible to have after I have uninstalled PowerISO and have no other similar software.