Burner has demon inside

i'm having a problem with my Acer CRW 2010A CD burner, which I
installed in my IBM Aptiva 2175 (K6-2 475mhz, 128mb RAM, Windows 98)
It works great, except...
A couple months ago the drive started crashing the computer, and
it did this while the drive was not in use. The CD burner was idle and
had been for several days when I noticed the PC was making a faint
twittering or squeaking noise. On close inspection, I observed the
work light for the burner was flickering, and the drive was up to
something (there was no disk in it.) Then the mouse and keyboard
froze, followed by a crash. The PC balked at restarting till I
disconnected the burner, at which point things returned to normal.
I figured the burner was cooked, but when I plugged it in the
following day, it worked fine, and worked for a few days - then the
same thing happened. We went through this cycle a few more times, so i
just started leaving it disconnected and only hook it up when i need
it. It's a hassle opening the PC up, tho.
Why is the CD burner suddenly being activated when it's not
needed? Why does it get so crossed up?
The Aptiva does not seem to come with a master/slave cable.
I've tried going to the Device Manager and 'removing' the
drive, but it does not seem to make a difference.
Anybody got any ideas? other than spending another $60 on a new
burner? - Ъ×

dax wrote:

i'm having a problem with my Acer CRW 2010A CD burner, which I
installed in my IBM Aptiva 2175 (K6-2 475mhz, 128mb RAM, Windows 98)
It works great, except...
A couple months ago the drive started crashing the computer, and
it did this while the drive was not in use. The CD burner was idle and
had been for several days when I noticed the PC was making a faint
twittering or squeaking noise. On close inspection, I observed the
work light for the burner was flickering, and the drive was up to
something (there was no disk in it.) Then the mouse and keyboard
froze, followed by a crash. The PC balked at restarting till I
disconnected the burner, at which point things returned to normal.
I figured the burner was cooked, but when I plugged it in the
following day, it worked fine, and worked for a few days - then the
same thing happened. We went through this cycle a few more times, so i
just started leaving it disconnected and only hook it up when i need
it. It's a hassle opening the PC up, tho.
Why is the CD burner suddenly being activated when it's not
needed? Why does it get so crossed up?
The Aptiva does not seem to come with a master/slave cable.
I've tried going to the Device Manager and 'removing' the
drive, but it does not seem to make a difference.
Anybody got any ideas? other than spending another $60 on a new
burner? - Ъ×

The first thing I would suspect is a power issue. The addition of the
extra drive may be over taxing your aging power supply. Especially, if
you added the burner instead of replacing an older drive. Many
manufacturers give you just enough power to run the stuff originally
installed. You could also try a different power connector. Bending and
twisting during installation can sometimes loosen the wires inside.

good luck,

Enkidu

On Sun, 15 Feb 2004 00:45:35 -0500, Enkidu
wrote:

dax wrote:

i'm having a problem with my Acer CRW 2010A CD burner, which I
installed in my IBM Aptiva 2175 (K6-2 475mhz, 128mb RAM, Windows 98)
It works great, except...
A couple months ago the drive started crashing the computer, and
it did this while the drive was not in use. The CD burner was idle and
had been for several days when I noticed the PC was making a faint
twittering or squeaking noise. On close inspection, I observed the
work light for the burner was flickering, and the drive was up to
something (there was no disk in it.) Then the mouse and keyboard
froze, followed by a crash. The PC balked at restarting till I
disconnected the burner, at which point things returned to normal.
I figured the burner was cooked, but when I plugged it in the
following day, it worked fine, and worked for a few days - then the
same thing happened. We went through this cycle a few more times, so i
just started leaving it disconnected and only hook it up when i need
it. It's a hassle opening the PC up, tho.
Why is the CD burner suddenly being activated when it's not
needed? Why does it get so crossed up?
The Aptiva does not seem to come with a master/slave cable.
I've tried going to the Device Manager and 'removing' the
drive, but it does not seem to make a difference.
Anybody got any ideas? other than spending another $60 on a new
burner? - Ъ×

The first thing I would suspect is a power issue. The addition of the
extra drive may be over taxing your aging power supply. Especially, if
you added the burner instead of replacing an older drive. Many
manufacturers give you just enough power to run the stuff originally
installed. You could also try a different power connector. Bending and
twisting during installation can sometimes loosen the wires inside.

good luck,

Enkidu
thanks, Enkidu, but if that were so, would it run well when I actually
DO hook it up to use it? as it is, it does this crash thing when it's
not even supposed to be on... i tried reloading the driver, both the
one that came with it and another i got off the net, to no avail... -
Ъ×