Was asked by a friend to have a look at a second-hand PC he'd got.

Problem was that neither of the optical drives were being recognised by either the BIOS or Windows (ME).
After a bit of research online I swapped the ribbon cables over (HDD connected to IDE2 and optical drives to IDE1), and then back again.
This solved the problem, but only temporarily; after a couple of reboots the drives vanished.
Anyone know if this is repairable or is the IDE controller on the mobo shot?

I tried changing cables, drives, checked the jumper settings etc. No effect.