[saylaa]

I have an HP DVD Writer 400c and Samsung CD-R/RW SW-224B installed on my HP Pavilion 511n. They are not being detected. I have uninstalled and rebooted and reinstalled countless times and it hasn't worked. I have tried updating the driver to no avail and even HP Tech Support can't help. I bought the PC used, if that makes a difference. PLEASE HELP ME!!!

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Hi saylaa,

Welcome to Geeks to Go.

What I mean is this.

You have one cable connecting from your motherboard to your Hard Drive and another from the motherboard to your DVD/CD drives. These are known as Primary and Secondary Connectors.

What I would like you to do is see if the cable to your hard drive has a flat connector about half way along it that isn't connected to anything.

Let me know when you find it.

[Octagonal]

Hi saylaa,

Welcome to Geeks to Go.

What I mean is this.

You have one cable connecting from your motherboard to your Hard Drive and another from the motherboard to your DVD/CD drives. These are known as Primary and Secondary Connectors.

What I would like you to do is see if the cable to your hard drive has a flat connector about half way along it that isn't connected to anything.

Let me know when you find it.

[saylaa]

For this I need to open my tower, correct? How do i do that?

[Octagonal]

Is this on the computer that you are using here right now?

[saylaa]

Yep... Of course I realize I'll have to shut down... but I follow directions pretty well if you give them step by step for me to write down.

[Octagonal]

OK, give me a couple of minutes and I'll write up a set of instructions for you. I'll also see if I can find a link to a page that you can print out for reference.

[Octagonal]

Hi saylaa,

OK, here the best link that I could find.

http://peripherals.a...tallcddrive.htm

If you have any questions or unsure about doing this please let me know. I would also advise printing these instructions out and also the pages in the link I have supplied above. Print a copy of each step in the link.

1. Shut down the computer and unplug from the wall socket.

2. Open tower casing. This will be done by removing screws at the back (around the edge) and sliding the side cover or entire cover off.

3. Locate your Primary and Secondary IDE cables. Your Primary cable is the one that connects to your Hard Drive and the Secondary connects to your DVD/CD drive/s. Let me know if this is not the case.

4. Disconnect the cable from the dvd/cd drive at the end of the chain. Each cable will have a connector at the end and also one connector about 4 inches or so back from the end that allows connection to another device. Make sure that the Primary has a second connector back from the end of the cable. Let me know if this is not the case.

5. Unplug the power cable to the device. This will be a flat plastic connector with 4 wires in it, usually loacated at the right hand side of the device (looking from the back).

6. Uplug the sound connector. A thin 2 wired connector usually located on the left hand side of the device (looking from the back).

7. Remove the dvd/cd device from the system by removing the screws from each side.

8. Set the Jumpers at the back of the dvd/cd to Slave. There should be a diagram on the dvd/cd drive to show you haow to set the jumpers. Make sure that you record what these settings are before you change them as you will have to put them back to this setting when you finish.

9. Connect the dvd/cd drive to the empty connector on the Primary cable.

10. Connect a spare power cable to the dvd/cd device.

11. Plug the wall socket back in and turn on the computer.

12. If the device is connected properly the computer should detect it.

13. If the device still isn't detected, shut down the computer and unplug it from the wall socket then reverse the above steps to return your system back to the way it was. Remember to set the jumpers on the back of the device that you moved to the way they were initially.

Let me know how you get on.