Part I Last September I bought a CD burner because my son Chris was interested in making music CD’s and because I wanted to have the use of one for copying larger files without having to use a zip utility and spanning multiple floppy disks. I was able to find an Imation on sale at BestBuy and installed it into the computer that Chris and his brother Joshua use, a homemade (Merle Nicholson brand) running an AMD233-MMX. It installed easily, and we encountered the first problem. I had installed it on the IDE cable that contained a 40X CD, and when we tried to copy from one CD to the other CD we encountered buffer error messages. Calling the local TECH SUPPORT (Merle), it was suggested that we needed to have each CD an a separate IDE controller, and after some rearranging of both CD’s and both hard drives we were up and running. Everything appeared to be working, and we both learned how to use the Adaptec software that was included with the CD writer. Between the kids and myself we made use of it 1 or 2 times a day for different projects and had become very happy with its performance.

Then a couple of months ago Chris started complaining that it wasn’t working right, and that he was getting BLUE SCREENS which were preventing him from making a CD. I would use it daily to copy downloaded files that I could use on my computer and also take to other locations. Without the use of a cable modem this allowed me to only download once at night when less traffic was on the net. Very seldom did I copy a CD, but I was continually adding files to re-writable CD’s. I had not encountered any BLUE SCREEN copying single files and asked Chris if he could create a BLUE SCREEN for me.

The BLUE SCREEN message offered no clues on which file had a problem so I couldn’t look at a specific problem file, but I had had a similar experience in the past that suggested maybe an overheating problem with the AMD processor. I had encountered countless similar problems when the computer was built. I removed the AMD chip and replaced it with a Cyrix chip that ran great and found out later that the AMD needed a special heat sink and fan for cooling, I replaced them with AMD approved equipment and solved those early BLUE SCREEN problems.

I opened the computer case to see if maybe the fan wasn’t working or was off-center and saw what was a possible problem: one of the IDE cables was directly over the fan, cutting down the air flow. I than called Imation to find out if there was anything else I could try to get it working again, and they suggested that I update the firmware. So I obtained a longer IDE cable and downloaded the suggested version of firmware. Since I had the case open to replace the cable I decided that I would add some grease to the heat sink to further help with the cooling, and I routed all cables away from the chip. I then went to replace the firmware as suggested and proceeded to kill the CD completely. The access light stayed on at all times, the ejection buttons did not work and the CD properties appeared as the firmware update. Imation was called and more help was requested. They apologized and stated that sometimes the firmware updates didn’t work, but they would e-mail me the original firmware version to return it to the beginning condition. That also didn’t work, and the CD remained locked. When I called Imation and offered to return it to them, they agreed and issued the RMA authorization. That night when I walked in to dismantle the case and remove the CD, I noticed the CD access light was off and pushed the eject button. It was working, so I went to the CD properties to see what it showed and saw that the original version was there. I was impressed to say the least. I grabbed a blank CD and proceed to make an audio CD. It worked correctly, and I told Chris that his machine was back in working order. I called Imation and offered to keep the CD and give it a week of use before taking them up on their return and exchange for a new CD-RW. It performed with no problems for a month and all was well until……

Part II Chris wanted to replace the the 4x4x20 CD-RW drive with a faster CD-RW, and we started watching the ads to see if we could find an affordable 8x speed for him. BestBuy had an ACER 8x4x32 on sale so here we go again. I removed the Imation and replaced it with the ACER and have experienced no problems (other than he now wants a faster CD-ROM installed to keep up with the new CD-RW—he wants a 50X instead of the 40X ) up to the time I am writing this. But what to do with the Imation CD-RW?

My computer has an empty bay, and we can’t have that now can we. The CD-RW installed quite easily in my case, and the Adaptec software as well. The CD-RW properties showed correctly, so I proceeded to try to create a CD as a test. A BLUE SCREEN appeared the minute the computer tried to read the blank CD, but this time I got files included in the BLUE SCREEN and started to look for help. Both files were vxd (device drivers), so I began to experiment with them. I called Imation and explained that I was moving the CD-RW to another machine and was having problems again. I declined the first suggestion to upgrade the firmware because of the last experience with that update.

We started by renaming the vxd’s to see what would happen. We were able to get the CD-RW to work sometimes but eventually we would get a BLUE SCREEN referencing the same two files , CD_Read.vxd and CDVSD.vxd, even after they were renamed. I could get the CD-RW to work making data CD’s or Audio CD’s depending on which file was renamed, but I wasn’t going to rename files each time I wanted to make a CD. These files where located in WINDOWS\SYSTEM\IOSUBSYS and CD_Reader.vxd was also located in an additional folder called Recordit for a program from IOMEGA. The tech person suggested that maybe the IOMEGA Zip that was on the same IDE cable might be causing the problem. He suggested that we uninstall Recordit and also remove the ZIP drive from the cable. The problem remained.

I also had noticed, each time a BLUE SCREEN froze the computer, upon the restart an error message from AdaptecDirectCD stated that the CD properties had either the "Disconnect" or the "AutoInsert" settings unchecked and that they needed to be returned to the correct settings and the computer restarted. According to the tech, Imation had reports that on some computers the "AutoInsert" needs to be turned off but never that the "Disconnect" needed to or could be turned off.

We then decided to try turn them both off to see what would happen, but first we needed to stop the error message from AdaptecDirectCD each time that the machine started. We uninstalled the Adaptec program then went and turned off both the "AutoInsert" and "Disconnect", returned the two vxd’s to their original names and rebooted the machine.

I have made one each Data and Audio CD’s successfully as of this writing with no apparent problems and definitely no BLUE SCREENS. Imation says that the "Disconnect" setting should be enabled in order for the CD-RW to work correctly, but the tech and I agree that if it works not to change it. I had told them that the IDE controllers and chipset were capable of UDMA66 the first time that I called after installing in the second machine, and they now "THINK" that may be the reason for the problems. Imation also offered that this model was not designed for Windows98 or for the UDMA66 speed.

I have learned a few more things about computers with this experience, which is always good, but the one I will remember is that, eight months after I purchased an Imation CD-RW I was able to get a support person on the phone each time I called within two minutes and they were more than helpful. I will look for their products in any future purchase simply because of this terrific support. u