CD/DVD writer on IDE SLAVE question

[crice]

Does putting a DVD or CD writer on the IDE slave effect its performance? Most instructions for DVD or CD writers tell you to put the device on MASTER, but I have a situation where it must be put on SLAVE. Are there any drawbacks/speed/compatibility/error issues that results from putting the device on slave?

 

[Demonicon]

I would advise against putting a DVD writer as slave. It will still work but not to its full potential. You really should list why you can't put it as master, maybe there is another device in the chain that the DVD writer should take precedence over.

 

[slicksilver]

Plextor recommends setting is at master thats why I have mine set at master.

 

[neutralizer]

Isnt that one device per channel can work at one time?

 

[crice]

I posted a problem in Technical Support about my setup. For some reason, my 120gb seagate drive doesnt work correctly when set to secondary SLAVE, but works fine when set to master.

My setup is as follows:

PRIMARY MASTER: maxtor 80gb
PRIMARY SLAVE: seagate 80gb
SECONDARY MASTER: liteon 811s burner
SECONDARY SLAVE: seagate 120gb <-- problem drive

If i switch the 120gb to secondary Master, everything works fine. Right now I'm having some weird problems - which is here
and which is why I am asking this question!

 

[Demonicon]

Try booting into safe mode and deleting the drive listings there. At least remove the drive listings that are on the secondary controller.

If that doesn't work I would try the drive as primary slave and see if you have similar issues with one of your other hard drives as secondary slave.

Edit:
Make sure you have the jumpers set correctly and the end cable connection on the master drive and the middle connector on the slave drive.

 

[crice]

Delete drive listing as in going to device manager > secondary IDE > uninstall? (which I have tried)

I will try putting the drive as Primary SLAVE and see what happens. Jumpers are set correctly and I do not use cable select

EDIT: Sorry that I am going a little off topic here

 

[Demonicon]

Yes, sorry. I meant in device manager in safe mode. Remove everything from the cd/dvd drives section even if everything looks peachy. If it shows, remove the seagate as well.

 

[crice]

Originally posted by: Demonicon
Yes, sorry. I meant in device manager in safe mode. Remove everything from the cd/dvd drives section even if everything looks peachy. If it shows, remove the seagate as well.

ok, did that. The drive still has the same problem.

After that, I changed the 120gb drive to be primary SLAVE. And lo and behold, it is working - fine and dandy. BIOS detects it at boot up, windows sees it correctly and assigns it UDMA 5. I have no idea what is wrong! Why can't it work on secondary slave!?!??! gahhhhh

 

[Demonicon]

Remove all drives and only put your 120GB Seagate back on as secondary slave. If it fails to recognise then it would seem you have a faulty secondary controller. If not, it's likely you need a bigger power supply.

 

[crice]

Originally posted by: Demonicon
Remove all drives and only put your 120GB Seagate back on as secondary slave. If it fails to recognise then it would seem you have a faulty secondary controller. If not, it's likely you need a bigger power supply.

Thank you, I will try that right now

 

[crice]

Looks like I finally resolved the problem. In my BIOS, I turned off the "quick boot" mode to allow the drive time to spin up. Now everything is back to normal.