DVD Writer problem

[#1]

I had a 'Lightscribe' DVD Writer on my PC when I bought it. I added a DVD Rom drive I had lying around to ease copying from disc to disc. It was easy to install as 'slave' and worked fine. I then got an LG DVD Writer to replace the DVD Rom drive. The LG would not work.
Windows XP could 'see' the drive & there are were no issues with it in device manager and I contacted LG for any driver updates and reinstalled the LG as the Master, becauses LG insisted on that. Now the LG works, but the slave [now the Lightscribe] still does not work. I changed the cable connection on the mother board, as there were 2 connectors and I was only using one. This prompted Win XP to reinstall and 'recognize' the drives again and all seems ok except the slave still will not play discs. I always get the same error message as before, that there is no disc in the drive when there really is!. I'm totally at a loss with this, as I've tried everything I can think of.
I made sure the jumpers were in the right place for master and slave and I've now tried putting the jumpers on the cable select pins and nothing changes the state of play! I've been into CMOS and both drives are listed correctly as maser and slave, whichever way I have the jumpers!
It's a real mystery.
Firmware is updated & drivers seem to be ok.
Any one got any ideas?

[#2]

Should they perhaps be cable select (CS) not Master/Slave?
Is the ribbon cable an 80-core cable with Blue, Grey and Black connector blocks?

[#3]

You cant use cable select if its an old MB and may not support it or you dont have a CS cable. If its a CS cable then there is a hole in the 28th wire does your have this? If not use Master/slave and not CS or convert the cable see
http://www.unixwiz.net/techtips/ide-cable-select.html

[#4]

Quote from: HPsauce

Should they perhaps be cable select (CS) not Master/Slave? I did state but maybe not clearly enough that I've tried the jumpers as both cable select and Master/Slave. Either way it makes no difference. Is the ribbon cable an 80-core cable with Blue, Grey and Black connector blocks?

I did state, but maybe not clearly enough, that I've tried the jumpers as both 'cable select' and Master/Slave. Either way it makes no difference, I still have the same problem.
The ribbon cable is as you describe but I did not count the cores to see if there were 80.

[#5]

samuria, thanks for the advice. I'm not sure I want to pay much attention to a piece written before September 2002 that can't take into account modern cables. I get the impression that nowadays all cables are CS capable. aren't they?
Regardless, I still have the same problem, whether the cables are CS or not and wherever the jumpers may be; it's probably not a cable problem.

[#6]

Just a theory, not had this problem myself, but have heard about people with problems if the IDE cable is really long ... is your cable long or really short and just abou fits between the devices you wish to connect?
SW.

[#7]

You say you are only using one MB connector, if you have/can get another cable you could use both the connectors with one DVD on each.

[#8]

Thank God, Some lateral thinking. Use two cables!
I'll try it.
I have another cable on a spare machine.
Neither cables are overly long nor short, they seem to be a good length for the box.

[#9]

Did you get it working?

[#10]

Quote from: Midnight

Did you get it working?

This is a weird problem. I have it partially working, but have not had the time yet to try 2 seperate cables for each DVD. At the moment I can ask 'Nero' to write to the 'Lightscribe'  and it willl do so, but Windows does not see any discs I put in the 'Lightscribe' drive! So at the moment, the other DVD drive (Master) will play discs and the 'Lightscribe' (Slave) will not, but the 'Lightscribe' will write to blank discs!
At the moment, as I have this 'work around' where I can actually read/play discs in one drive and write in both, I can actually do all that one usually needs to do. I have not yet tested it, but see no reason why I can't copy from a disc in the Master to the Slave device. So I have the use of the 'Lightscribe' as a writer, but not as a player. The LG Master drive will read/play and write, so together I can manage most tasks I require; I just can't use the Lightscribe to play discs because Windows does not see them.
I think this must be a Windows problem, somewhow.
I'm delaying trying 2 EIDE cables, one for each DVD drive, as these cables occupy so much space and will clog airflow. I wish I had SATA DVD Drives! I already have a hot Athlon 64 +3700 processor so I hesitate doing anything to interupt airflow.
Phones ringing got to go...........

[#11]

Just a thought, but what about resetting the BIOS to defaults, forcing it to re-detect the drives. It might think it's still the old DVD-ROM, and isn't 100% compatible when it tries to talk to it. Just a thought.

[#12]

Quote from: Rikaitch

Just a thought, but what about resetting the BIOS to defaults, forcing it to re-detect the drives. It might think it's still the old DVD-ROM, and isn't 100% compatible when it tries to talk to it. Just a thought.

I've recently updated the BIOS: would resting it to defaults undo that? I imagine not.
If it was thinking it was the old DVD Rom, which was able to play discs wouldn't this DVD writer also be able to play discs? I guess the system may be as confused as I often get dealing with Windows!
Thank you for your suggestion: I really appreciate the help, from all you guys.
I will try it.