Lappy cd hosed?

[thumphreys]

I got a Gateway Solo 2100 from a friend. He said it wouldn't recognize the CD drive in the BIOS. I figured out that it just needed a little more ummph to get it seated right (it' s a modular drive). Now I can get it in BIOS and in the Win Me Startup(loads as drive E) and it spins and works real hard and flashes its little light but always: Abort, Retry, Fail?

No OS on the hard drive, that's what I'm trying to get done. I'm suspecting that the drive itself is hosed, but I'm hoping not. Anybody think of anything I'm missing?

TIA
Tom H

[BipolarBill]

Examine the drive connection. You may have pushed a pin clear into the drive. If so, you can pull it back out (you may have to open the enclosure), straighten it and use it.

[rmanet]

Originally posted by thumphreys
I got a Gateway Solo 2100 from a friend. He said it wouldn't recognize the CD drive in the BIOS. I figured out that it just needed a little more ummph to get it seated right (it' s a modular drive). Now I can get it in BIOS and in the Win Me Startup(loads as drive E) and it spins and works real hard and flashes its little light but always: Abort, Retry, Fail?

No OS on the hard drive, that's what I'm trying to get done. I'm suspecting that the drive itself is hosed, but I'm hoping not. Anybody think of anything I'm missing?

TIA
Tom H

I suspect a bad drive meself but you could probably shop around and get a new (or used) one for $40-50 or even less - I've been able to find DC adapter, DVD and CD drives for my laptop (Dell, it's an older PII266) the DVD I got on EBay for $23.....power adapter (very pricey normally) got for $19 and all it needed was a different power tip

good luck

[DocEvi1]

always try fixing first!

Whats a modular drive anyway - no cables and slides into a slot?

Stefan

[rmanet]

Originally posted by DocEvi1
always try fixing first!

Whats a modular drive anyway - no cables and slides into a slot?

Stefan

I think that's what they call mine - goes into a slot

If his buddy didn't take real good care of it who knows how he carried it around - I saw a guy on a plane yesterday shove his cdrw/dvd laptop drive in the back of the seat in front of him - obviously it's a company laptop so he doesn't care - they'll pay to replace it someday ....

I think that laptop is a P166 so it's fairly old - how do you fix a laptop cd drive other than trying to clean it? be good to know if mine ever goes, but I'm real careful with my laptop drives......

oops - and if it's an older drive it may not read some burned cds, I assume you're getting the error with original program cds?

[thumphreys]

Yah, modular like slides in and out of a slot. The same slot can be used interchangeably (sp?) between the cd, a floppy or a second battery. The little connectron doesn't have pins per se, but sort of a male/female slot with a series of contacts that mate up. Like an ISA or PCI slot but much smaller. I wiped 'em both down with alcohol as best i could but no change. I'm going to try to see if I can scare up a known good unit to test it so that I don't throw any money at the wrong problem.

Thanks!