CDROM works, then it doesn't. WHY

[saturnine]

i have several cdrom units that one minute they will work fine and the next will not work at all. they are allowing me to open and browse the files, even install a program. but when i change the cd and put in another cd, the cdrom becomes unaccesible. i will then pull the cdrom out and put in the original cdrom and the same thing occurs. does this sound like a mobo problem, or am i cursed with mutiple bad cdroms?

any help is greatly appreciated.

 

[TonyT]

What OS are you using? Did this just start, or were the drives always acting like this?

EDIT

Also, what are the makes/brands of the drives?

 

[saturnine]

win98se

the original drive is a toshiba 4x and the second is a afreey 40x.

seems like this has popped up in recent months. i have 10 identical pc's (clones) and most are having this problem. at first i just said "ok, its time to replace the drive", but its too coincidental that most are having the same problem. i wonder if its a y2k thing??!!??

i didnt have any problems until 4 months ago tho

 

[saturnine]

update; i found if i shutdown and remove the power cord, then plug it back in and restart, the cdrom works. when i eject the disk, and insert a new one, i get "D:\ is not accessible".

 

[TonyT]

Have you tried enabling/disabling DMA access for the drives? That is, if DMA is enabled, disable it (and vice versa).

 

[saturnine]

tried that no werkie

the only thing i can think of is a bad mobo. even that seems unreasonable considering of the 10 pcs, 6 of them have had the cdroms replaced. the ones that have had them replaced, i have had to replace 2 of those. maybe its a voltage thing. the pcs are 4 years old. maybe they have outlived thier usefullness. well... this is me thinking out loud, again any help is appreciated.

 

[TonyT]

Have you tried reformatting the hard drive and reinstalling the OS?

 

[saturnine]

on this current sys, i have not. but a couple of the others i have. did not help

 

[TonyT]

Have you tried changing the IDE cable? Have you made sure the power cable is firmly inserted into the back of the drive?

Also, can you swap cd's indefinitely in DOS, or does something happen there as well?

 

[saturnine]

<< Also, can you swap cd's indefinitely in DOS, or does something happen there as well? >>



ill try this :0

the ide cable has been swapped and the power cable is firm

 

[Topochicho]

Remove the cd before boot and wait till machine is running before cd insert... if problem goes away you probably have the drive mounted or something like that under the system properties

 

[saturnine]

Topochicho, thats not the problem. its when i exchange cd's after finishing using the first one.

this is a win98se pc. maybe the mounting info is not getting refreshsed accurately??!!??

 

[emjem]

Enable &quot;auto detect CD&quot; and your problem may go away.

 

[saturnine]

thanks emjem, i tried that too. i bought a promise ata66 controler yesterday. when it comes in, i will be bypassing the mobo. i have also looked up on the internet to try and find my mobo on there, but no luck. wanted to see if there were any issues.

 

[emjem]

Since you have the same problem on 10 computers it is doubtful that it's a &quot;bad hardware&quot; issue. I think it most likely has to be in software. Are they networked?

I have seen the problem you describe on a number of systems. I think it's an os issue. Everytime CDs are changed the system will not read the new CD until you click on the drive several times. Can you get the 2nd CD to read by clicking back and forth between C and D a few times?

This problem would go away when &quot;auto detect&quot; was enabled but you already tried that.

Another remote idea is that the CDRom drivers are not compatible with SE. Did you install SE on all of the computers about 4 months ago? Either way you may want to try updated CDRom drivers.

The only remaining thing I can think of is irq conflict. I hold out no hope for that as the problem but you might look anyway.

 

[BadThad]

What IDE do you have these on and how are they mastered/slaved?

 

[saturnine]

these are intel boards with on board ide connections. one for the hard drive, and one for the cdrom.


the current machine im having problems with actually has win95 installed. so i dont think its a win98se problem.

im not haveing to mush luck finding the board on intel's site. the only identifiying markings on the board are: PBA 641587-203 AND CA 643160-001. there are two intel chips, SB82371FB and SB82437FX-66. this board has built in ati mach64 vid chip and crystal sound. amibios (c) American Megatrends, inc. BIOS ver 1.00.06.CL0

 

[saturnine]

update found a link Advance/AS Mother Board support and Driver Download

 

[saturnine]

ok update: i have tried to create the same problem in dos. booted to a dos prompt with cdrom support, and tried to swap media. same problem. i bought a promise ata66 controler card and will retest on fri.

thanks for the responses to date

 

[emjem]

You said you had WinSe installed -- now you say Win95. WTF? You smoking some funny weed?

 

[saturnine]

only the best here

no, most of the 10 machines are running win98se, this one that has teh current problem has win95. i wasnt very observant on that note.

after i test the promise card, i'll update.

 

[BadThad]

Well, you've answered one question. If it does it in DOS, it's definately a hardware problem.

So, based on what you said, the hard drive is on PRIMARY IDE as single/master and CDROM is on SECONDARY IDE as master...right? There is NO other drives on the IDE channels...right? Make sure the jumpers are correct.

 

[emjem]

I agree Badthad -- except, there is no way in this world that I can imagine 10 different PCs having the same friggin problem. Unless, someone has gone into each box and buggered em up.

On top of that, at least one is on W95 and others on W98SE (I guess), so it's not even likely to be an OS problem.

Geez, they don't even all have the same brand CD Rom drives. I think its in the water cooler. Something very fishy here and I QUIT.

 

[BlackhawksFan]

check your ide controllers in the win98se device manager, are there any exclamation points by them?

run a virus scan as well, some viruses cause your ide controlers + devices to not function properly- they sometimes give the ! by the controller in device manager

if your computers are networked, sounds like a virus might have spread thru your network possibly

 

[brow]

I have to agree with Blackhawks, definitely could be a virus.. There's a lot of them that will infect your master boot record and prevent your cdrom/ide controllers from functioning properly