DVD rom has problems reading Cds in Windows

OK before I yack on here is my system specs

Asus A8N-SLI premuim
Athlon xp 64 3200+ W Zalman cooler
Dual EGA gforce 6600 gts in SLI W Zalman coolers
Soundblaster XFI extreme music ( This card rocks )
Both hard drives are SATA
One WD Raptor 36 gig eventually for Linux, used for storage now
One WD Caviar 16 250 gig drive , Boot drive one big partition
Two DVd burners
Primary master is Pioneer DVR 109
Secondary Master is a Pioneer DVD 110D
Antec 550w power supply
OS is Windows XP pro sp2

I have no problem booting to my windows cd, Once I get windows installed it seams to take forever for my dvr 109 drive to recognize that I have placed a driver cd into it ( Another drive on the same cable would not even recognized the Asus drive cd )
If it does it is very slow to read the cd , I may try another ribbon cable, I am using the 80 wire cables for both drives
Is this a controller issue with the nvidia chipset or a drive issue, I have had problems with nvidias ide driver in the past so I don't load it ( Disk Io errors )
I am almost thinking of trying a DFI board because my video cards need the spacing with the zalman coolers , Maybe DFI builds a better board, and I did not have this problem on my Gigabyte board, I had to discontinue using that board since I installed the Zalman coolers
Anyone got ideas, should I try that game fix ? :eek2:

check your BIOS.maybe the cd-rom doesn't recognized in BIOS....or your line were not linked well....or your system file broken or missing.....all cause your problem as I know

Moving this to cdrom/dvd section



and i'd replace the cable before anything else is looked at.

Yep swapping the cable out sounds well worth a shot & if you have an old 40 sense cable you know is ok, try that, as I've discovered nvidia chipsets, when also connected to sata, suffer from a condition very similar to what used to happen if you mixed up speeds on IDE before we got IDT.

Which (p)ata driver are you using for IDE ? The standard M$ one - or one of nvidia's ? (if its nvidia quote the exact wording, as there's a few varieties ).

I think I'm concluding lately that most chipsets just don't 'like' sata/pata mixes, & nvidia especially ;)

Right now I am using the MS driver for the PATA dvd burners, I had issues with the nvidia ide driver
I would hate to have to buy two plextor SATA dvd roms as they are expensive

So ? did you try a fresh cable ? & did you try it with just one dvd drive at a time ?

What software have we got installed at this point ? Any burning software that might be causing problems ?

I'm back finally
The problem is with both drives one is the dvr110b and the other is the dvr 109 , both are by poineer
This prolem arrises under a fresh windows installation, I have swapped the drives around and still slow reads from both drives, Each drive is on its own PATA channel , When I switched to a new DFI board the cables were switched, same problem, I sitll have to reinstall Windows
I switched to a DFI lanparty board with the same chipset , I am seriously considering the new SATA Plextor drives, this would tidy up my case a lot
I wonder if it is a chipset issue , Darn and I need a newer power supply for this DFI board

as ED sais before trying a 40 sense cable sometimes works wonders in situation that you have now,this is what i would try first,my 2 pfenning

Stupid question, but I did not see it mentioned anywhere. Same problem with different cd's? Is the windows boot cd a slipstreamed you made or original from Microsoft? - different brand media - same issues?

Do you have another DVD burner you could try besides a Pioneer? (dam good drives btw - I use the same two on my personal gaming machine).

I have run across similar before and like you and confused said, it was a issue with nvidia's drivers. I have also seen this type of behavior with certain brands of media.

All the cds I have issues with are factory cds including Windows XP pro
With the new mobo I decided to see if the Asus cd would autorun and it is the same, very slow, the drive seems to quit, then go again and load the launch screen, I also tried it with the DFI cd and it is basically the same
I have tried this with both drives , with the nvidia driver which I am running now and with the driver that comes with Windows
This also happened with my LG combo drive, I could not load any drivers off of the motherboard makers factory cd
Also according to my mobos bios my chipset is at 45 dgrees with the fan at full noisy throttle, Maybe it's time to go back to Intel based systems, even though I like my athlon 64

Bah, nvidia chipsets do my head in ! :rolleyes:

Have you tried any bios flashes on your motherboard ? Generally these will help - there's a very new bios, on Asus's site for these boards, showing as 'Beta Version 1011.006 2006/03/07 update '..

I have changed my motherboard and installed a DFI Lanparty UI expert , It took a while to get used to he bios
I have tried swapping the drive cables and all the other suggestions, This new board I have flashed with the latest bios from DFI
For the heck of it I hooked up and old LG 52x cd rom drive, It was just a read only drive, It spun right up and read both cds in seconds , Go figure
I tried the Pioneer dvr110d in my Intel based system and it was still sluggish, Maybe they ought to say 2x cd rom speed instead of the higher speed they advertise
I am almost to the point of giving up on optical drives , Maybe I should just go back to a basic system with just a cd rom, hard drive and one video card
I sitll have to reinsall XP on this new board , I wanted the activation to work on it first before I format and reinstall

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Originally Posted by format c:

.. For the heck of it I hooked up and old LG 52x cd rom drive, It was just a read only drive, It spun right up and read both cds in seconds , Go figure ..

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Ahhh well that's light (at the end of this here tunnel), & points me at the firmware for your Pioneer's being responsible, so I did some more googling on that idea, & found lots of folks struggling not only with pioneers but lots of other 'Dual & Double Layer media capable' drives & SLI capable chipsets & might explain why I'm always puzzled about matters, as the prices for those are roughly 10x a 'normal writeable' dvd & I just don't put them in for customers normally because of this ..

Another more prosaic answer might be to buy yourself a DVD rom to fit internally & then maybe buy yourself a usb caddy for either or both of your writters ?

I think that light we see at the end of the tunnel is a train !
With those usb enclosures I find that they do not have enough amperage for a dvd writer, I tried my benq in one and it would not even show or detect in Windows
I was looking at this Plextor DVDRW SATA drives , they are pricey , I an wondering if running one or two of these would clear up my issue, since all my drives woulr be SATA drives
I think nvidia better do something with their chipsets , but remember this drive was slow on my intel system

Sata DVD drives oughtn't to be any more expensive than those with an ide interface, disk drives certainly aren't ;) (sata is cheaper, most times) - however not many folks make 'em as yet, as even 16X dvd isn't filling up 'ata 33' so why do you need something faster ? Well you don't - but soon, in the not too distant future, we'll see motherboards with just sata (on cost grounds) & if you want IDE connections you'll need to buy your own controller, but in the meantime, besides Plextor - MSI also make sata capable DVDRW's (infact MSI put out the first sata connected device, a cd/dvd combo).

I'd maybe though try some judicious firmware flashing on the pioneers.

(btw I didn't mean a self powered usb drive, I meant one with a plug ! ;) - as your comments about voltage are 'fair play' ).

On the subject of 'will all sata fix it ?' - err maybes not - as the only time I've got either an MSI or Plextor sata drive working correctly is on Intel's ICH5/ICH6 southbridge, so pretty much the answer to all of this is 'the technology is immature' - but that's not much flaming help is it ? :eek2:

:mad:
I am about to take this computer out to the back and shoot it, that light at the end of the tunnel was a train
I went out and bought and LG cdrw drive and installed it, then I popped the cd into it and expected it to spin up and display the dialouge
Ya right, the drive chugged along at .5x and then just quit, I opened the " My computer " icon and the stupide drive had dissappeared from "My computer" and it did not show up in device manager , It had three minutes earlier as I checked before popping in the cd
I did the Windows reinstall with this drive and it stalled out then spun up during the install, I used my factory cd, It was burned with a setup.sif file so I could avoid typing in that product code, which is hard to read
The result is a messed up Windows installation, I get script errors when opening the user accounts in control panel
I used nlite to compile the cd
So the drive is going back and I may toss them my computer , I am not getting another optical drive , It seems that there is too much junk out there
What would a good drive be to work with the Lanparty board ( If I keep it ) , I am totaly stumped and frustrated, I may wind up buying an off the shelf system and scrapping this thing for parts
All I want is a computer that works, reads cds and dvdsm, burns them , games, Internet, Maybe a Mac is in order?
Or an older box like the tank I am on now running Linux ?
Anyone want a slightly used PC ?

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Originally Posted by format c:

Ya right, the drive chugged along at .5x and then just quit, I opened the " My computer " icon and the stupide drive had dissappeared from "My computer" and it did not show up in device manager..

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Normally when that happens, that's windows being stupid, as its finding too many dma errors & deciding the drive can't just go slower, & it turns it off !! (most 'annoying' as you well know ;) - its supposed to turn the drive down one speed at a time, but if the drives use dma 33 & aren't 'multi-word' dma capable, it can't use PIO directly & gives up - you could set PIO mode mannually in bios as a temporary workaround & pray for updated motherboard bios/ DVD firmware that can fix it 'good' - but it'll run a bit slower for reading etc - PIO mode 4== 1/2 of dma speed )

You are getting these issues because you are just 'randomly' combining kit, pre-made systems get tested for this sort of incompatability first (I know, I do lots of this for various 'big boys' - what's supposedly technically ok & what's practically compatible are two very different things)

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Originally Posted by confus-ed

You are getting these issues because you are just 'randomly' combining kit, pre-made systems get tested for this sort of incompatability first (I know, I do lots of this for various 'big boys' - what's supposedly technically ok & what's practically compatible are two very different things)

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Could you explain in more detail please?

And I have the same problem, only not as bad. I have a very similar setup, Asus-A8N-SLI premium, two Sata drives, and a Lite-on ATA DVD-RW (writes dual layer too) My drive seems to autoplay slower then the drive in my old computer.
P.S that Asus setup CD loads slowly on mine too, I think the CD itself is "slow".

Well I returned that drive since it was just plain dead, But it did help me to find the possible problem
I was using these special molex connectors that you squeeze to release them from the drive , I figured that my drive was not getting a good power connection, the faulty drive had a sloppy power connection
So I used the tool supplied with the special molex kit to reinstall the orignal black molex connectiors, I fired up my system and popped in the DFI cd and it read it in reasonable time
I did the same test with the Asus cd and it read in reasonable time , I agree those motherboard cds tale a while to read so I took that into consideration
When I returned the drive I picked up the Enermax liberty power supply since the DFI board has the 8 pin 12 volt connector, My old psu had only the 4 pin
This freaked the board out as it would not post, So I gave it a hard reset and she booted right up and very quick, Did the cd test and all is good
So now I am reinstalling Windows , Lets hope she holds up
Thanks Confused for all the help, Next time I am checking the power connectors for the drive and making sure I do not have two many devices on one power cable. Two at max :)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Loopy

Could you explain in more detail please?..

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I pressume my remark;- ..just 'randomly' combining kit.. ?

If you are a home builder generally what you do is a little research to make sure everything can fit & meets specifications (voltage support, correct timings for devices etc etc), & there ain't so much more you can do practically to make sure it works, besides assembling the stuff & seeing if it really does work .. & if it doesn't ? ;- well just what bit 'bust it' ? & was that due to some software issue because of poor install routines, lack of patches etc etc or some hardware issue (like this one turned out to be)& something was faulty or some 'misconception error' that results from either wrong or very often mis-leading/inaccurate technical specifications which don't mean much to most folks .. I'm sure you get the general notion..

& that's what some 'big boys' farm out (as some prefer independent testers & often its cheaper) & some do this internally ; this practical checking process, almost like 'burn in' used to get thought of as, you just try it all together (your 'new machine') & attempt to run 'normally..'

(well I do random stuff & actively try & break things most times, wheras others have a set list of 'can it do this?' operations)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by format c:

..Did the cd test and all is good
So now I am reinstalling Windows , Lets hope she holds up
Thanks Confused for all the help ..

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I think you sussed that one yourself ! :thumbs: & I hope it keeps 'behaving' too ! :)

I guess a multimeter (preferably digital, as analogue is harder to read as the pointer 'bounces' & makes accuracy difficult) might've helped you quite a bit in diagnosing this, but folks at home don't have 'em - but for any homebuilder they are almost essential, & they ain't expensive really ..

(I'm not so sure I'd have thought of testing a sufficiently rated Antec supply tho' even if I did have a few things hanging off one rail - they are normally excellant as a brand in maining both wattage & amperage).

I have it all together now and it seems to be running stable, Cds take a bit to read but it is better. I find DVD drives allways take a bit to get going
I do have a digital multi meter, How would I test a system, I did do some tests when I was installing those fancy molex connectors and discovered that all the black wires are a common ground
Now all I have to do is load some games and push this sytem a bit

Here you go then - Using a Multimeter (you need a bit of electrical understanding though, & if you haven't got that, I'd suggest you forget my tip, as electrocution from not understanding how to do this safely is quite common ! :eek2: )

Looks pretty basic, I have used the multimeter on my car to test for contiuity, It looks different for the PC
Since my PC is working, I will leave it alone and play with the car