Background Info:
Advent 7055 laptop (P4 3.06GHz 512 ram) XP Home SP2
DVD-RW drive - Pioneer DVR-K12
Hard Drive - Toshiba MK8032GAX (80gb)
Before I get into the details, any answers to these questions may prove a shortcut to the answer I am looking for:
1) Can the jumper select setting on a laptop hard drive affect whether the DVD-RW drive is seen by the bios?
2) Do DVD-RW drives require drivers to be installed to work?
OK, Here we go,,,,
My laptop came supplied with the original pioneer dvr-k12 drive.
It was visible in the bios and in 'my computer' but apart from that seems to be dead. There is no response at all when putting a disc in, no spinning, checking or lights etc.
The laptop came with no hard drive so it has had a new one put in with a clean XP Home install. There is no jumper pin on the back which I believe means it is set to Master. See link below:
http://www.buyaib.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&ProdID=2187
I have bought another Pioneer dvd-k12 drive (used but supposed to be 100% working). I put this drive in and there are signs of life!!!
It pops open and seems to check discs (spinning sound and lights).
But this one is not seen by the bios and it is not in 'my computer'.
This seems strange to me as it's the exact same drive as the one I took out!!!
I don't know much about laptops but have read that they are fussy about master and slave settings on dvd drives etc. I was wondering, as i don't know if the dvd drive is master or slave (and has no jumper pins) could the setting on the hard drive affect anything?
I have never thought that dvd drives, hard drives etc needed drivers, especialy with windows xp. But out of curiosity I borrowed a CDRW from another laptop and put it in mine. I know for a fact this drive works! In my laptop, once again it is not in the bios, but this time it did the whole 'new hardware found' thing and started the drivers installation wizard. (but I had no internet at the time so didn't go any further).
The obvious thing is to look and see if there are any drivers for the drive but I can't find any.
Has anybody else replaced a laptop dvd drive and had similar problems? Any help will be very appreciated!
Xbox 1.6 Executor3 EvoX 120gb
Custom white case, controler port and power button blue LED mods.
AMD Athlon XP 2.2gig, 120gb 7200rpm HD
512mb PC2700 ram, Delta Audiophile soundcard.
27" HD LCD, 450w dolby digital system.
