re-format - unable to access lg cdrom drive

[scotbruce]

just bought a (home-built) system running ME and want to format and install w98se (personal preference + no system disk for ME).
w98se start-up disk cannot find the LG CRD 8480M cdrom drive, so presumably has no suitable cdrom driver.
Downloaded driver for the cdrom and added it to the boot disk, but still same problem.
In words of one syllable and bearing mind that, although I can fdisk and format, I have absolutely no knowledge of DOS, can anyone please help me to get the cdrom drive recognised/driver installed so that I can format and install w98?
thanx

[BipolarBill]

Are you sure it's not recognized? When the Win98 floppy boots, it creates a RAM drive that pushes your CD drive letter up by one. If it was D before, try E from DOS. ;)

[scotbruce]

As sure as I can be.
I don't really know how to change drives or anything much else in DOS.
Once it starts to boot from the floppy, it says it cannot find a cdrom drive and says the installation is being aborted.
Then it installs the virtual Ramdrive and finishes up by saying,
"The diagnostic tools were successfully loaded to drive D.
Device driver not found: 'MSCD001'.
No valid CD ROM device drivers selected.
To get help..........."
and leaves it hanging on the a prompt.

I can access fdisk and format as normal, but don't want to delete ME until I'm definite that I'll be able to access the CDROM drive and install 98.

[BipolarBill]

Does the CD drive work properly in ME?

[scotbruce]

No. Windows Media Player comes up and tries to play any cdrom - data or whatever - as an audio cd.
I thought that was just a problem with media player.

[BipolarBill]

I would assume that the laser has gone bad in the CD drive. :(

[scotbruce]

any easy way for me to confirm that?

[BipolarBill]

You can confirm by the process of elimination. Replace the cable and check the jumpers on the drive. Check for bent or pushed-in pins in the drive and motherboard. Clean the drive with either compressed air or a dedicated cleaner. Remove the drive fom Device Manager

If no joy, it's a goner. Chances are that the drive will not return after you remove it from DevMgr.

[scotbruce]

swapped a cdrom drive from this machine into the other whilst I was away - it worked fine.
re-installed the LG cdrom drive - now it works fine, too!

any way of working out whether it was wrongly installed - loose cable etc - or if this is going to be a dreaded intermittent fault?

I don't know whether to be happy or sad. Nor do I know whether to risk carrying on and formatting the hard disk and installing w98.

I suppose the alternative is to keep it as ME for a few days and see if the fault re-appears.

symptoms on the LG 8480M were:
any cdrom was recognised *only* as an audio cd, which windows media player (before I deleted it) tried, but failed to be able to play as an audio cd. That included an audio cd, a bought data cd and a data cd-r.

thanks again, all, for any further suggestions.

[BipolarBill]

It sounds like a loose cable. We can rule out driver corruption because of the DOS issues.

Wait a week. You could use a break. ;)

[scotbruce]

You're right.
What with the cdrom drive acting up and my carrying out my first attempt at installing a modem at the same time....
I removed the Diamond Supra modem from the 'new' base unit and installed it in mine. Now that I've got it working I can remove the pathetic Conexant/Rockwell effort this Advent came with (I know, I know - how could I buy a PC, especially my 2nd, from PC World? It was too good a buy - 2 years ago now (it's only a P3 500 as is the new base unit, coincidentally) - and I've been lucky with it not needing any after-sales service.
As far as the loose cable goes, I take it you mean the IDE ribbon cable *might* not have been fully pushed home, as I don't see how the connection plugs on those cables could come loose or anything.
Whilst I'm on the subject, how do you tell how many wires are in an IDE ribbon cable? I've just (also) installed a new Maxtor hard disk and I think that, to take advantage of its speed, I should have an 80 wire cable ? I don't know if my motherboard can handle it as it's an 133 udma, but that's another story.
Thanks again.

[BipolarBill]

Standard IDE is 40-pin/40-wire. Any HDD/motherboard will benefit from an 80-wire cable.