Fellow Computer Enthusiasts,

One of my New Year's Resolutions was to copy (at least a portion of) my CD
collection to my hard drive as mp3s and then to CDRs. I accomplished this
task (at least the method) with the help of several PCSoft contributors. But
this experience has created a whole new set of questions. A little personal
history is necessary. Several years ago (about 1997, almost the dark ages of
the internet), I decided to invest in a CDRW. At the time, CDRWs cost in
excess of $450, and the scsi model I wanted was about $550. It was a
blazingly fast Yamaha CRW 4260 that recorded a CDR at 4x, a CDRW at 2x, and
played a CDR at 6X. I had two objectives - backing up my hard drive and
copying/mixing my own CDs. The information I as able to obtain at that time
indicated I would have better luck with a scsi writer than EIDE (atapi). So
I took the plunge and invested in a scsi adapter, the Yamaha CRW 4260 and a
Teac CD-516S CDRom that would do digital audio extraction (DAE) at 4x.
Seemed a good match for the burner. The setup worked well for many years.

Fast forward almost 6 years. I needed to replace a faulty IDE CDRom and find
that I can get a new CDRW with 48x read, 48x CDR write and 16x CDRW write
for $45. The $15-$20 I could save with a CDRom is lost in the added
versatility I gain with the greatly enhanced IDE CDRW. Checking the
interaction between the scsi CDRom, scsi CDRW and IDE CDRW I make some
interesting discoveries. The IDE CDRW will do DAE at 23x (according to roxio
EasyCD), the scsi CDRom at only 3x, and the scsi CDRW at 5x. Add to the mix
that the scsi adapter is a Diamond FirePort 40, an adapter no longer
produced, no longer supported by Diamond, and dropped from the Microsoft
supported hardware (although the website would indicate otherwise-compatible
but not designed for XP). I was able to get the adapter to work using some
Win2k device drivers downloaded from the net. But I wonder how long before a
problem erupts.

Add to the mix that I am putting together a computer from extra parts to use
as a Linux learning tool. I understand that Linux is quite friendly to the
FirePort 40 adapter. The current WinXP setup has the IDE CDRW as the Master
on secondary ide adapter. I have a removeable hard drive bay set up as the
slave on second channel. Two more disks utilize the primary ide channel. So,
all the current ide adapters are filled. The scsi adapter attaches to just
the old CDRom and CDRW. I would like to attach a newer, fast DAE capable
CDRom or CDRW to the computer to speed the system up.

So finally, I get to the question: My computer is pretty filled up, but I do
have a free pci slot (and removing the scsi adapter would provide another
open slot). I was wondering if anyone has utilized a pci ide adapter (i.e.,
for ATA133) to add additional ide equipment to their computer. It would be
an added bonus because my mb only supports ATA100, and I have a new ATA133
drive. Can I use one of these cards to add a total of 8 IDE devices to my
system? Will I run into IRQ problems (my modem complains when I install it
but eventually learns to "get alone" with everyone)? I think that overall,
this would be a less expensive alternative to purchasing a new scsi card and
CDRom and/or CDRW. Other alternatives could utilize firewire or usb 2.0
connections, but again, that would seem to be a more expensive proposition.

As a side issue, of the three CD drives attached, only the IDE is connected
to the sound card. It plays audio CDs without a hitch. The scsi CDRom will
not play, but the CDRW will (again, neither is connected to the sound card).
Using roxio EasyCD, I can use either scsi CD as the source for a DAE. I can
also use the IDE CDRW as the source and the scsi CDRW as the destination.
While trying to set up the system to rip songs from CD and save as mp3s, I
found that CDex did not recognize any drive as a source except the scsi
CDRW. dbPoweramp would rip from any of the three. Just looking for comments
as to why the differences.

Thanks for your patience and any suggestions.

Jim
[log in to unmask]

              The NOSPIN Group is now offering Free PC Tech
                     support at our newest website:
                          http://freepctech.com