Problems installing external NEC DVD RW

[Evanton]

*Points at title.*

Hi, I just got the aformentioned external NEC DVD RW ND-2500A USB drive recently. I plugged it in and it seemed to install without problems, although I noticed that it described itself as CD Drive (G from the outset, but I didn't let that bother me as it showed up as it should in device manager.

The first time I tried to burn a DVD though (using Nero 6) it came back telling me that I was trying to burn a blank DVD in a CD RW drive.
Now, I've looked all over the web and I did come across one person with a very similair problem. He apparently fixed it by setting the DVD/RW drive as the 2ndry master, turning off the DMA and setting nvram or escd to enable.

I tried to do this myself and had several problems - first off - the DVD RW isn't always available in the BIOS as an option for the 2ndry master, and even when it is, if you re-boot it reverts back to the CD RW instead. 2ndly, I could not find any reference to DMA/nvram or escd in the BIOS at all.

I very rarely fiddle with the BIOS so I might need baby walked here...
Can anyone help? Or better still, suggest a different way of doing it?
I'm on Win XP, AMD Athlon 2400+ with about 2 GHZ if any of that matters....

[saladbarkid]

If you're using Nero 6, it gives you a choice if you want to use the CDRW or DVDRW as the recorder. Maybe you havn't chosen it in Nero.
In Nero, under new compilation, in the top left corner of the window there is a choice of CD or DVD.
In Nero Express, there is a choice at the very beginning. Above all the choices of burning (Data, Music, etc.) Choose DVDRW or CDRW.

[Evanton]

Thanks for the quick answer.

I nearly felt very stupid there as I had in fact missed that, but when I changed it over it still said the same thing and the problem remains. Besides, shouldn't it show up as a DVD Burner in my computer? I've never owned one before so I wouldn't know...

[saladbarkid]

Actually, you are correct. It should show up as a DVD RW in My Computer as it does in my PC. I'll have to do a little more research.

[Evanton]

If it's of any use to you (or anyone else) the other person who seemed to be having almost the same problem tells his story, and it's soloution, here:

http://forums.windrivers.com/archive/index.php/t-60892

Also noticed in Nero it lists my devices as:

Image recorder [DVD]
Image recorder [CDR-R/W]
E: HL-DT-ST CD-RW GCE 8320B [CDR-R/W]
G: NED DVD RW ND 2500A [DVD]
G: NED DVD RW ND 2500A [CD-R/W]

So even though it lists the device as a DVD RW by name, the option to use it as a DVD RW isn't there....

[Evanton]

To be fair, all I really need to know (I think) is what DMA is and how to turn it off, as at this point I'm pretty convinced that'll fix it.I've searched the BIOS and can't find it.