can someone help me asap pleaseee

does it appear as your d: drive ?

no, nothing is appearing at all. its as if the drive isnt even there

Try here

http://welcome.hp.com/country/uk/en/welcome.html#Support

If you know how to check the bios have a look in there to see if it's listed...if it isn't then maybe the unit is broken...it also might be that the thing will work if you remove it from the laptop then reseat it...there should be some sort of locking screw holding it in.....you might have to lift a cover up or something like that....all you do is take it out then push it back in and go from there...

thx swearbox, ill try that if i cant find a driver online

no need for drivers mate....if ur using vista try this.... http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314060

lol cheers mate, i aint rli got a clue when it comes to the technical side of computing lol. ill try it then. cheers

now it keeps sayin the windows automated troubleshooting service has stopped working. this happends everytime i try :( i dont know what to do lol

reboot + start again....i don't use vista so i can't really get right into it...

lol will do. ill let u know if i have success or not lol

like i already said...check the bios first to see if it's listed....when u startup the laptop hit the following keys one after the other until the bios appears... F1, F2, Del (dunno which one fires up the bios on ur lappy)...once in it's menu driven...u should see ur hard drive and optical drive listed...if it's not listed then that's ur start point (ie drive may be fvcked)....press F10 to exit.