Dell desktop problem

[friedemann]

PC is older Dell GX1 (Pentium3)desktop.
No internet connection.
Only thing hooked up is monitor.
Original optical drive was BenQ cd/DVD with Burner(which I used in that PC to install WindowsXP professional.

I have a second different brand machine (Azura "Pentium2") with faster motherboard speed.
Original Optical drive is Creative36Xmx which I used to install Windows XP pro. No problems.


When problem occurred.

It was suggested that I swap the optical burners from slow machine to faster machine.

I did the physical part of the actual moving of the hardware.

Needless to say, that is when both machines could not see the new optical drive.

I got the "Azura PC" with the BenQ optical CD reader to work. That was over a year ago.

Since then, the "Swine flu" was a hospital visit with complications.
starting off 2010 in Emergency. (not due to food poisoning or alcohol or car accident)

It has been tough.

Anyways regarding the "Dell PC" It used to fire up with WinXP GUI. The creative optical drive would rev up and down like it is looking for a CD.

I noted on the back of the Creative that the jumper was in "Master"

So, reving means there is power. However when I put in a Windows type disk - the reving stops and it does not read the disc.

Checked My Computer and Drive A shows, Drive C shows. Drive D is not there.

So went into Dell BIOS. start up priority order: Drive A, Drive C,PXE.

PXE is a new thing for me. It is a stand alone pc. I just looked, and thought I got out of the Bios properly, but the XP GUI did not show up again. I shut off the computer. Then powered up the computer...and it opens on the BIOS with PXE in my face. It also mentions that a cable connection is problematic. I changed the IDE cable with 2 others and they all say the same thing. These cables work on other machines.

I just moved the jumper from "master" to "cableselect". Does not make a difference.

What am I looking for when it is complaining about :

2 beeps

PXE-E61: Media test failure, check cable
PXE-MOF: Exiting PXE

Strike F1 to retry boot, F2 for setup utility

[stroyal]

Is this the only device on the Cable?
If there are 2 drives, both must be CS, or 1 Master, and 1 Slave.
Some boards won't work without a 40 pin 80 conductor cable, even on optical drive,(which normally don't need it).
With 80 conductor cables the master must be on the end.

Double check the number 1 pin lines up with the red stripe.
Check your BIOS, the drive will have to show up there first.
Get rid of PXE boot in the boot order.
Not sure how you got PXE in the boot order, but that should be disabled, as it is for network booting.
I know very little about it though.

I have never seen a real problem with CD drives unless the drive is bad.
I don't think I missed any set up problems, there are just not that many thing to set,from win 98 on.



Edit;
If you do have 2 drives on the cable, I have very rarely seen 2 drives that won't
play together.

If it where me, I would have tested it in the other computer, to make sure it still works.
Ultimately, that is the only way to test a drive.