SCSI HDD with EIDE CDROM?

bonesdds

New Member
I've just inherited a P4 computer that has a SCSI controller and SCSI HDD. It appears to have an EIDE cdrom and it doesn't work. Can a SCSI controller run and EIDE cdrom or do I have to buy a SCSI cdrom? Don't know anything about scsi. Thanks.
 
You can't hook the CDROM to the SCSI controller but if you use the ATA controller on the motherboard it should work fine.
 
Thank you for the information. The cdrom does not show up under "my computer" and it appears to be connected to the ATA controller. I was just shooting in the dark with the previous question. The drive spins and the light turns on, but doesn't show up. Any suggestions how to trouble shoot this. Thanks.
 
Double check that the cables are connected properly and that the drive is set for master/slave as needed. If it's the only drive on the cable or it's on the end connector set it to master, if there are 2 drives and it's on the middle connector set it to slave.

If that's all in order check that the drive is setup properly in the BIOS. Depending on the BIOS you might be able to set it to set the PATA(IDE) drives to auto detect.
 
The jumper was set to cable-select, but per your recommendations I switched it to master. It is at the end of the cable in the master position. I checked the bios and it is set to IDE auto. The lg cd -r/rw blinks 4 times then nothing when inserting a disc. Thanks again for the guidance.
 
Does the BIOS detect the drive when posting? If you are able to, disable any logo on the post screen (if you can't try pressing escape) and see if it says anything. LG drives should show up as "HL-DT-ST CD-RW <model #>"

If you have another system, try replacing the CD drive in it with this one temporarily to see if it works.
 
During the bootup, I only see the scsi controller and hdd. I tried pressing <esc> to no avail. At this point, I think it wise to follow your second suggestion and test the drive on a different computer. Here's some irony. I primarily run Ubuntu (laptop, unfortunately) and secondarily run mac, so I don't have a PC to test it on. I'll have to borrow someone else's. This may take a day or two, so please don't give up on me. I really appreciate your assistance thus far. I'll check the drive and post.
 
In a pinch, go next door. Borrowed working cdrom from neighbor. Drive did not work in my machine. Not a true positive with regards to my drive, but helpful information. Should the cable be plugged into IDE2 or IDE1? While I had the case open, I noticed that the HDD is connected to the scsi controller and the cdrom is connected to the IDE2 connector on the motherboard. The 3.5 floppy is connected and working to another connector on the motherboard. Hope any of this helps.
 
Ok. Other things to try is another cable and if it still doesn't work switch over to IDE1. The important thing to know was if a the drive was the problem and if a known working drive didn't work it's likely that your drive is fine.
 
I'll check the cable later tonight. More times than not, it's that simple. But it never is, for me. I've checked all of the connections and it all looks fine. This computer had serious virus/malware/trojans/worms...and is now testing fine. I think I reset the bios to default in the process of fixing it, though. When I check the bios boot settings, the cdrom is listed as "not installed". Could it be that I erased the cdrom configuration settings when I was fixing the virus problems?
 
[Solved] Success! My previous suspicions proved correct. It was a bios setting. Thanks Cromewell for your assistance. Is there any way to upvote you? I really appreciate your help. I opened the bios settings and set all ide drives to auto (primary 0, primary 1, secondary 0 and secondary 1). When I rebooted, it told me that primary 0 and 1 and secondary 1 failed. I turned those three off and left secondary 0 set to auto and it booted with the cdrom. It lists on the bios on the boot sequence, it shows in device manager and it opens CD's. What a relief. Hope this helps others. Goodbye.
 
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