#CD ROM Questions
4 messages in this thread
I am looking for a CD ROM and sound board for my system. I have a 386/33
clone, two IDE hard drives, 8 Mb memory, Mountain IDE tape backup, DOS 5.0,
Windows 3.1, QEMM/386 6.02, SVGA (1 Mb memory), Microsoft Serial Mouse. I
would like the CD ROM and sound board to be MPC.
Everything I read about CD ROM systems indicate that they are SCSI
interfaces and I don't have SCSI. If I get a SCSI CD ROM and a SCSI
adapter/interface board, can I still use my IDE stuff (hard drives and tape
system) or will I then have to convert to SCSI components all around?
I also understand that the Creative Labs CD ROM/sound board kit are MPC,
but the CD ROM runs off of the Sound Blaster board; this is a proprietary
(pseudo SCSI) interface and should allow me to continue using the IDE
components. Is this true?
I guess what I really would like is the Sound Blaster Pro 2.0 board, etc.
and a high speed CD ROM drive (NEC 73M/83M ?) that would both work on my
system. I could be swayed to think otherwise, but I need someone to advise
me as to what I should be looking for.
Any ideas, help, or advise would be greatly appreciated.
Randy
Randy, I have a partial answer to your question. Not all CDROMs are SCSI.
Most are, if your include the Parallel-SCSI interface in the definition;
but some drives, notably the Sony Laser Library (which is not technically
MPC-compliant), have a proprietary interface. The latter should be fully
compatible with the IDE devices you already have. My setup is very similar
to yours, and it all works.
I'm about 99.5% sure that the SCSI CDROM adapters sold with the various
popular drives are also compatible with IDE and MFM hardware; I've seen
several. But, there have been some horror stories hereabouts when people
have tried to daisy chain CDROM's with dissimilar SCSI devices or use
existing SCSI adaptors. Good Luck! Kevin–
Kevin,
Thanks for the feedback. I thought that most manufacturers would not leave
me out in the cold with my IDE drives, but I'm not always sure. I am,
however, looking for an MPC compliant drive. Also, I have been given some
more feedback today and am fairly convinced (as you have indicated) that
most SCSI adapters would allow me to use the MPC CDROM and the IDE drives
w/out any problems.
Continuing my search….thanks for the help.
Randy
Randy, check out the latest issue of PC World. It contains a great article
on SCSI based CD Roms.
-Tom