Windows will not Assign a Drive Letter to my CD-Rom

[himini]

OK I think this is a tough one. I'm working on a customer's Win98SE computer that had lots of malware which has now all been removed successfully. Windows updates are current. I noticed his CD-rom drives didn't show up in "My Computer" so I went through some standard troubleshooting steps. Drives are recognized in Bios AND in device manager. I've swapped out with other drives same problem. I've changed his IDE controller settings to "Both IDE channels enabled." I've tried uninstalling the drives to let Windows re-install on reboot. No change. Yet I booted up his computer with a BartPE disc no problem. So I don't think it could be a hardware problem.

I've also tried changing the "reserved drive letters" for the cd-roms (in device manager) but still no change. When I reboot Windows will still not assign a drive letter even though the drives are recognized and working properly. Any ideas?

Thanks in advance for any help or suggestions.

[jtdoom]

hi

is tweakui installed?
tweakui can hide letters from you (supposedly a memory booster)