Older Intel 440BX Mobo - CD-ROM Errors

Hi!

I'm trying to help my Mom troubleshoot her computer (I wish she would
upgrade, but has a bunch of old devices hooked up incl. SCSI and doesn't
want to fool with it!). Every couple of boots, it quits recognizing her
CD-ROM's. They have been installed for years and have run with absolutely
no problems (1 original CD-ROM and 1 8x HP CDRW). Sometimes the BIOS will
give her an error that there were no drives found on that channel. I think
I fixed that problem, but I can't figure out how to troubleshoot the other.

I found an article about the Intel 82371 AB/EB PCI controller where the
drives will only run in native mode and I found a registry setting that
would tell the computer there were no IDE devices on that channel under
HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Set up. I deleted the
registry entry, rebooted and the drives were recognized. But, then after a
few boots, the same thing pops up again. Sometimes the registry entry will
be there, I can delete it and see the drives again. Sometimes the entry is
not there and I have to reboot a few times to get it where I can edit it
again.

Any ideas what would cause the errors and how can I fix it so the errors
quit? I'm tired of driving 2 hours every other week to try to troubleshoot
her computer!

Also, if there is a better newsgroup to post this. please let me know. This
was the only one I could find that came close.

Thanks!!!

Interesting...how does that affect the CD-ROM channels?

"Greg Surratt" wrote in message
...
Have you checked the mb battery?

On Thu, 6 May 2004 00:07:45 -0400, "Karl Burrows"
wrote:

Hi!

I'm trying to help my Mom troubleshoot her computer (I wish she would
upgrade, but has a bunch of old devices hooked up incl. SCSI and doesn't
want to fool with it!). Every couple of boots, it quits recognizing her
CD-ROM's. They have been installed for years and have run with
absolutely
no problems (1 original CD-ROM and 1 8x HP CDRW). Sometimes the BIOS
will
give her an error that there were no drives found on that channel. I
think
I fixed that problem, but I can't figure out how to troubleshoot the
other.

I found an article about the Intel 82371 AB/EB PCI controller where the
drives will only run in native mode and I found a registry setting that
would tell the computer there were no IDE devices on that channel under
HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Se tup. I deleted the
registry entry, rebooted and the drives were recognized. But, then after
a
few boots, the same thing pops up again. Sometimes the registry entry
will
be there, I can delete it and see the drives again. Sometimes the entry
is
not there and I have to reboot a few times to get it where I can edit it
again.

Any ideas what would cause the errors and how can I fix it so the errors
quit? I'm tired of driving 2 hours every other week to try to
troubleshoot
her computer!

Also, if there is a better newsgroup to post this. please let me know.
This
was the only one I could find that came close.

Thanks!!!

On Thu, 6 May 2004 09:26:24 -0400, "Karl Burrows"
wrote:

"Greg Surratt" wrote in message
.. .

On Thu, 6 May 2004 00:07:45 -0400, "Karl Burrows"
wrote:

Hi!

I'm trying to help my Mom troubleshoot her computer (I wish she would
upgrade, but has a bunch of old devices hooked up incl. SCSI and doesn't
want to fool with it!). Every couple of boots, it quits recognizing her
CD-ROM's. They have been installed for years and have run with
absolutely
no problems (1 original CD-ROM and 1 8x HP CDRW). Sometimes the BIOS
will
give her an error that there were no drives found on that channel. I
think
I fixed that problem, but I can't figure out how to troubleshoot the
other.

I found an article about the Intel 82371 AB/EB PCI controller where the
drives will only run in native mode and I found a registry setting that
would tell the computer there were no IDE devices on that channel under
HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Se tup. I deleted the
registry entry, rebooted and the drives were recognized. But, then after
a
few boots, the same thing pops up again. Sometimes the registry entry
will
be there, I can delete it and see the drives again. Sometimes the entry
is
not there and I have to reboot a few times to get it where I can edit it
again.

Any ideas what would cause the errors and how can I fix it so the errors
quit? I'm tired of driving 2 hours every other week to try to
troubleshoot
her computer!

Also, if there is a better newsgroup to post this. please let me know.
This
was the only one I could find that came close.

Thanks!!!


Have you checked the mb battery?

Interesting...how does that affect the CD-ROM channels?

As most (if not all) motherboard bioses scan the IDE buses during each POST to
autodetect connected devices, most likely a bad mb battery wouldn't have
anything to do with your mom's problem.

Btw, what OS? And have you tried connecting just one CD device at a time to
see if the symptoms change at all? Could it be one of the drives is going to
Heaven and taking the channel with it?

/daytripper

On Thu, 06 May 2004 21:22:04 GMT, Greg Surratt wrote:
On Thu, 6 May 2004 09:26:24 -0400, "Karl Burrows"
wrote:

Interesting...how does that affect the CD-ROM channels?

"Greg Surratt" wrote in message
. ..
Have you checked the mb battery?

On Thu, 6 May 2004 00:07:45 -0400, "Karl Burrows"
wrote:

Hi!

I'm trying to help my Mom troubleshoot her computer (I wish she would
upgrade, but has a bunch of old devices hooked up incl. SCSI and doesn't
want to fool with it!). Every couple of boots, it quits recognizing her
CD-ROM's. They have been installed for years and have run with
absolutely
no problems (1 original CD-ROM and 1 8x HP CDRW). Sometimes the BIOS
will
give her an error that there were no drives found on that channel. I
think
I fixed that problem, but I can't figure out how to troubleshoot the
other.

I found an article about the Intel 82371 AB/EB PCI controller where the
drives will only run in native mode and I found a registry setting that
would tell the computer there were no IDE devices on that channel under
HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Se tup. I deleted the
registry entry, rebooted and the drives were recognized. But, then after
a
few boots, the same thing pops up again. Sometimes the registry entry
will
be there, I can delete it and see the drives again. Sometimes the entry
is
not there and I have to reboot a few times to get it where I can edit it
again.

Any ideas what would cause the errors and how can I fix it so the errors
quit? I'm tired of driving 2 hours every other week to try to
troubleshoot
her computer!

Also, if there is a better newsgroup to post this. please let me know.
This
was the only one I could find that came close.

Thanks!!!




I've had problems similar to what you describe. As daytripper said,
without the battery, the POST has to scan the IDE channels at each
startup. If there's a secondary problem, the scan may not be
effective and the drives won't be properly recognized.

fwiw, I did not mean to imply that the bios scan of the IDE chains during POST
was conditional on the health of the battery.

The bios *always* enumerates IDE devices, whether there's a good battery
present or not....

/daytripper

It's a dual boot Win98/95/3.1 (usually only boots Win98). See why I want to
upgrade her!

I didn't have time last time I was up there to pull the drives, but the old
one may be going.

"daytripper" wrote in message
...
On Thu, 6 May 2004 09:26:24 -0400, "Karl Burrows"
wrote:

"Greg Surratt" wrote in message
.. .

On Thu, 6 May 2004 00:07:45 -0400, "Karl Burrows"
wrote:

Hi!

I'm trying to help my Mom troubleshoot her computer (I wish she would
upgrade, but has a bunch of old devices hooked up incl. SCSI and
doesn't
want to fool with it!). Every couple of boots, it quits recognizing
her
CD-ROM's. They have been installed for years and have run with
absolutely
no problems (1 original CD-ROM and 1 8x HP CDRW). Sometimes the BIOS
will
give her an error that there were no drives found on that channel. I
think
I fixed that problem, but I can't figure out how to troubleshoot the
other.

I found an article about the Intel 82371 AB/EB PCI controller where
the
drives will only run in native mode and I found a registry setting
that
would tell the computer there were no IDE devices on that channel
under
HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Se tup. I deleted the
registry entry, rebooted and the drives were recognized. But, then
after
a
few boots, the same thing pops up again. Sometimes the registry entry
will
be there, I can delete it and see the drives again. Sometimes the
entry
is
not there and I have to reboot a few times to get it where I can edit
it
again.

Any ideas what would cause the errors and how can I fix it so the
errors
quit? I'm tired of driving 2 hours every other week to try to
troubleshoot
her computer!

Also, if there is a better newsgroup to post this. please let me know.
This
was the only one I could find that came close.

Thanks!!!


Have you checked the mb battery?

Interesting...how does that affect the CD-ROM channels?

As most (if not all) motherboard bioses scan the IDE buses during each
POST to
autodetect connected devices, most likely a bad mb battery wouldn't have
anything to do with your mom's problem.

Btw, what OS? And have you tried connecting just one CD device at a time
to
see if the symptoms change at all? Could it be one of the drives is going
to
Heaven and taking the channel with it?

/daytripper

Most likely bad cable, or one of the CD drives is dying making the other
inaccessable.

Try it with just the CD-RW.

"Karl Burrows" wrote in message
. ..
Hi!

I'm trying to help my Mom troubleshoot her computer (I wish she would
upgrade, but has a bunch of old devices hooked up incl. SCSI and doesn't
want to fool with it!). Every couple of boots, it quits recognizing her
CD-ROM's. They have been installed for years and have run with absolutely
no problems (1 original CD-ROM and 1 8x HP CDRW). Sometimes the BIOS will
give her an error that there were no drives found on that channel. I think
I fixed that problem, but I can't figure out how to troubleshoot the other.

I found an article about the Intel 82371 AB/EB PCI controller where the
drives will only run in native mode and I found a registry setting that
would tell the computer there were no IDE devices on that channel under
HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Set up. I deleted the
registry entry, rebooted and the drives were recognized. But, then after a
few boots, the same thing pops up again. Sometimes the registry entry will
be there, I can delete it and see the drives again. Sometimes the entry is
not there and I have to reboot a few times to get it where I can edit it
again.

Any ideas what would cause the errors and how can I fix it so the errors
quit? I'm tired of driving 2 hours every other week to try to troubleshoot
her computer!

Also, if there is a better newsgroup to post this. please let me know. This
was the only one I could find that came close.

Thanks!!!