Installing a DVD burner

**TekDawg76** · January 18th, 2004, 11:03 PM

Here's my situation. I am trying to install a DVD burner into my system. Problem is that the IDE2 will not see the drive when using the auto detect in the BIOS. I can attach the drive to IDE1 and the BIOS sees the drive fine. Other problem is that the 2nd HD I have installed has the same problem. It cannot be seen on IDE2. IDE2 is functional, as the original CDRW that was attached to it is still detected, but no other drive seems to want to be seen by anything other than IDE1. Any ideas as to why IDE2 will not pick up on anything other than the CDRW drive?

System is an AMD 1400, 512 MB, 40GB, 120GB, running Win XP Home with all updates installed.

**flachebaq** · January 18th, 2004, 11:27 PM

Forgive me for asking an obvious question, but you didn't seem to mention this in your post:

Do you have the Master/Slave jumpers set correctly. Do not use the 'CS' or Cable Select option... Set one as Master and One as Slave.

What BIOS do you have?

**TekDawg76** · January 19th, 2004, 01:08 AM

I have tried all possible combinations of drives, cables, settings and each drive alone to see if the bios will detect it. I have AMIBIOS dated 09-13-02. My bios version is this: 62-0913-001131-00101111-071595-sis730s-m810lr-h. I know there is an update, but it requires access to dos to install it. Since I am on XP, there is no way to get to dos other than using command from the run box.

Everything I have read so far points to the board being a PCChips board, and that's where I went for the bios update, which I cannot run for lack of DOS.

So if anyone needs any more info, please ask. I currently have the DVD up and running. Had to disconnect the 2nd HD to do it though.

**Philgo** · January 19th, 2004, 02:22 AM

You can update your bios by using a bootdisk, get one here www.bootdisk.com

**TekDawg76** · January 19th, 2004, 11:01 AM

2 things:

1. Which boot disk do I need to make? The 6 disk set for xp or something else.

2. Why does this have to be so complicated?

Also, forgot to mention before, the bios version is 1.21.06

Shouldn't there just be a way to install drivers for the secondary IDE controller without having to flash the bios?

**SuperSparks** · January 19th, 2004, 11:08 AM

Any bootdisk for a DOS-based OS will do. Win98, WinME or DOS6.22 will do nicely. Then you just start up with the floppy in the drive and it'll boot to a DOS prompt.

Before reflashing the BIOS though, I'd be inclined to change the IDE cable first, and see if that does the trick.

**TekDawg76** · January 19th, 2004, 11:13 AM

Before I do the bios flash, I am going to try installing the update for the sis730s ide drivers.

**fubar** · January 19th, 2004, 04:10 PM

TekDawg76,

Just to clarify something for you here. You can boot your computer to any boot disk you have. It doesn't matter what OS you have installed. In fact, you can remove all hard drives and still boot to a disk.

I like to use a 98 disk because it has support for CD-ROM, but for your purposes it doesn't matter. Just be very, very sure the bios update you have is, in fact, for your bios. Flashing with the wrong file can permanently disable your computer...not trying to scare you here, just want you to be informed.

Hope this helps...Fubar

**TekDawg76** · January 19th, 2004, 05:14 PM

I'd like to ask if flashing the bios really is the answer to this situation.

**DrMDJ** · January 19th, 2004, 07:50 PM

To be honest, my guess is that a bios flash is likely not going to help your problem.

**TekDawg76** · January 20th, 2004, 03:08 AM

Well, to date I have completely removed every component from the system put it all back in the way I would like to see it set up. the BIOS did see the drives for a few boots, but then windows was having issues booting into anything other than safe mode, so I played around a little more. on the last reboot, the bios stopped detecting the drives on ide2 all together. So now I am right back where I started from. but at least now I know what all the components are in my system.

mobo: M810L v7.1a
cpu: AMD Athalon 1400
pdu: Antec 300W sl300s
riser modem
RAM: 2-256 133mhz chips
cdrw: phillips phccd4851/43
dvd: nec nd1100a
Video: Geforce mx400 64mb pci vga
nic: Kingston kne100tx
HD1: Maxtor 40GB
HD2: WD 120GB

Maybe I should just go buy another motherboard. Any ideas or recommendations that'll work with the parts that I already have? Not looking to spend a lot for this, but if it makes things easier, I might do that instead.

**chris wolf** · January 20th, 2004, 08:37 AM

yes, your motherboard is the pcchips m810lr. as you have probably noticed by now, pcchips does not make the greatest quality motherboards, nor do they support their products well.

per SuperSparks' suggestion: have you tried using a different ide cable for the secondary controller?

while i agree with DrMDJ that flashing the bios probably is not the solution, i'd like to issue this warning: if you decide to flash the bios, please use a basic dos system disk (fully formatted before being made into a system disk to ensure that the disk is good), not a windows 9x/me startup disk. the memory managers, cd-rom drivers, etc that are loaded with these disks can cause the flash to fail. if the flash fails, the motherboard may be unusable. i usually use a dr-dos 7.03 system disk for flashing, here is a utility to create one:

http://members.rvglug.org/~magtec/temp/drdflash.exe

**jstanek7** · January 20th, 2004, 08:52 AM

have you tried a new IDE cable?

**TekDawg76** · January 20th, 2004, 11:27 AM

Yes, all 3 80 wire cables work to connect to ide1, but not ide2. But the CDRW will connect to ide2 through any cable. Just not the DVD or 2nd HD.

**jstanek7** · January 21st, 2004, 10:42 AM

It sounds like your ide 2 is bad. I read that older cd roms and cdrw don't use all the pins like a hard drive or dvd burners.

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