win XP Pro cant see cd-rw

[ironass]

I run Win XP Pro on a P4-2.4 gig machine. I had 4 IDE drives (C:40 gig HD, D: dvd, E: cd-rw and F: cd rom) and all was fine, except I had ever so often to coax my USB 2.0 drive to come on. Ever since I got rid of the F: cd rom, I am having this crazy problem:
On boot or wake-up from hybernation, there is no E: drive. The BIOS shows it, but win XP does not. When I use 'Install new Hardware', as soon as the wizzard comes on, drive E: pops up and works (Its a HP CD Writer+9100, DLA not installed).
At the same time I am having trouble with IE. After connecting successfully to the ISP, the browser home page does not open (not responding). I have to give it the 3 finger salute and restart IE and everything is OK.
Any enlightenment in this matter is appreciated

[CoLdFeAr]

Make sure the Jumper settings are right (slave, master)

[amdkt7]

Perhaps it's time to do a reinstall of XP. Sounds more like a software (os) problem. You may be able to remove any drivers and do a reinstall to fix the problem.