Old Pentium system not recognizing CD drive... \ VOGONS

Old Pentium system not recognizing CD drive...

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First post, by Gigagator

Posted on 2013-06-13, 14:27

Gigagator Offline

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Hi all,
I recently got hold of a beautiful old Fujitsu ICL Indiana desktop from 1995. Found it on ebay, just couldn't let it go.

Ignore the things that look like scratches - that's my dodgy camera.
It's immaculate, except for the fact that it doesn't recognize the CD ROM drive.

I've tried every combination of jumpers, different CD drives, IDE cables, the two IDE channels but the motherboard won't recognize CD, not even in BIOS.

I'm hoping it's not an issue with the IDE controller since the HDD works and boots up fine.

Just wondering if anybody has any suggestions that may help me. The motherboard is an old Acer V12LC and the CD drive a Mitsumi FX400.

Much appreciated.

Last edited by Gigagator on 2013-06-13, 20:36. Edited 1 time in total.

Reply 1 of 4, by Hatta

Posted on 2013-06-13, 16:58

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Some BIOSs don't detect CDROMs. 1995 is a little late for that, but it's worth checking anyway. Have you tried installing drivers despite the BIOS not detecting it?

Reply 2 of 4, by Jorpho

Posted on 2013-06-13, 18:12

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Please do not post 2048×1536 images inline with your posts! A link will suffice quite nicely in this case.

Is the CD-ROM drive powering on at all? If it is at all functional, the Eject button (and the power LED) should still work regardless of whether the system detects it.

Reply 3 of 4, by vetz

Posted on 2013-06-13, 18:22

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Jorpho wrote:
Please do not post 2048×1536 images inline with your posts!

Agreed. Can't moderators start hammering down on this? Happens every week I feel.

On to the topic,
Boards like this (early socket 5/7) does not recognize the CD-ROM in BIOS, you need to activate it with drivers in autoexec.bat / config.sys.

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Reply 4 of 4, by Gigagator

Posted on 2013-06-13, 21:51

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Resized image in OP in line with your suggestions. Apologies.

Anyway, I had been fiddling around all night with this and finally found the solution and frankly, it was easy.

According to a manual I happened upon, it turns out setting the fixed disks to 'Auto' in BIOS does not work for CD drives; you must manually set the location of your optical drive to 'CD' for it to function. There was also the further suggestion of 'Always install your CD-ROM drive as the last drive and connect it to IDE connector 2.'

Unfortunately, the drive itself is clearly old and worn (as the August 1995 manufacture date would suggest) and has trouble reading discs. I've swapped it out for a fully working one for now and will refurbish the original.

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