MDD optical bays

[theweatherman]

First post here.

Anyone out there having problems putting 2 drives in the 2 optical bays of an MDD G4? Seem to be getting overheating problems. When both drives are in use, one or both optical drives (a combo-drive and a dvd-rw) starts acting up.

It could range from a "sense key error to dissappearing drives problem.

Anyway if anybody got some sort of work-around/solution, short of removing one of the drives, I would greatly appreciate it.

[extremyks]

To rule out overheating issue... make sure ventilation is ok by making sure air can circulate at the back of your Powermac.

You may want to get your Mac cleaned by a authorized Apple service provider. You'll be surprise how much dust build up can contribute to poor air circulation.

Another cheap way of cooling your MDD is to install PCI Cooler, here the link for steps.

Hope this helps.

[marvinp]

Silly question, but are the drive jumpers correctly configured as Master & Slave?

[Henjie]

Originally posted by theweatherman
First post here.

Anyone out there having problems putting 2 drives in the 2 optical bays of an MDD G4? Seem to be getting overheating problems. When both drives are in use, one or both optical drives (a combo-drive and a dvd-rw) starts acting up.

It could range from a "sense key error to dissappearing drives problem.

Anyway if anybody got some sort of work-around/solution, short of removing one of the drives, I would greatly appreciate it.

Hi there. Welcome to the forums. :-)

I also own an MDD G4 and up until last week, I have a 52x Lite-On CD-RW and an 8x NEC DVD±RW drive installed internally in my system. The CD-RW drive's in the top bay, configured as the master device, while the DVD±RW drive's configured as slave and installed in the bottom bay. Never had any problems re: overheating, etc.

Like what Marvin said, have you checked the jumper settings? Make sure that one's set as the master device and the other one's set as slave. It doesn't really matter which drive you set as master or slave nor the bay (top or bottom) it's installed it. Just remember that the master device is the one that will respond to the Eject key on an Apple keyboard, Option-Eject for the slave device. Or you can just set both drives to Cable Select (the top drive will be the master device in this case).

If it's not a problem with the jumper settings, then it just might be lack of ventilation like what extremyks said. If you take a closer look at the removable metal shield behind the optical drive bays, you'll notice that only the top portion has vent holes. If you're using an optical drive with a built-in ventilation fan at the back (ex. Pioneer DVD±RW drives), you need to install it in the top bay. The bottom bay is not recommended for those kind of drives since the hot air being pushed out of the back of the drives will build up inside the drive cage.

Also, make sure that the IDE cables are in good condition. Replacing the metal shield improperly can sometimes nick the cables.

Good luck!


~Henjie

[Edited on 4-11-2004 by Henjie]

[theweatherman]

Thanks for the replies.

I have actually played around with different configurations. Swapping the drives into different positions and of course their appropriate jumpers. I have tried using cable select and master and slave jumper settings. What I did notice was, when using the drives, it does produce so much heat as to make the door cover of the bays, hot also, not too hot to the touch, but considering there is a space between the drives and the door, you could probably imagine how much heat the two drives produce (I don't recall seeing ventilation holes in the drives itself, or fans like some do).

I guess, the next step would be to either put one drive in an external case or add extra cooling. With regards to dust, the G4 is relatively clean still, maybe a few more months (I do open it up every now and then to blow and brush away some of the dust that are accessible)

By the way don't know if this might have any bearing (or probably the reason) -- the machine is an MDD 867 G4 with 896 ram. 2 drives, the original 60 gb Seagate plus an 80 gb maxtor. The optical drives are- LG GCC 4520 DVD/CD-rw combo drive and a Optorite DVD-RW 4x (burns 4x DVDs just fine) both are bootable.

Thanks again

[Henjie]

Originally posted by theweatherman
I have actually played around with different configurations. Swapping the drives into different positions and of course their appropriate jumpers. I have tried using cable select and master and slave jumper settings. What I did notice was, when using the drives, it does produce so much heat as to make the door cover of the bays, hot also, not too hot to the touch, but considering there is a space between the drives and the door, you could probably imagine how much heat the two drives produce (I don't recall seeing ventilation holes in the drives itself, or fans like some do).

That's weird. My optical drives don't get hot at all, even when using my DVD±RW drive to do 8x DVD burns. Can you pinpoint which of your two optical drives is overheating? Or is it both?

I guess, the next step would be to either put one drive in an external case or add extra cooling.

I think the external case idea is better. Firewire will even give you more bandwidth to play with than that allowed by the ATA-3 bus used by the MDDs for their optical drives (50MB/s vs. 16.67MB/s). Dunno how one can add extra cooling inside an MDD's optical drive bays. :-)

By the way don't know if this might have any bearing (or probably the reason) -- the machine is an MDD 867 G4 with 896 ram. 2 drives, the original 60 gb Seagate plus an 80 gb maxtor. The optical drives are- LG GCC 4520 DVD/CD-rw combo drive and a Optorite DVD-RW 4x (burns 4x DVDs just fine) both are bootable.

Your system doesn't seem to be culprit. The 60GB Seagate and the 80GB Maxtor drives run relatively cool (at least compared to my hard drives). Plus your MDD's power supply unit have enough power for all your drives.

I'm wondering if one of your MDD's internal cooling fans is broken though. Can you verify that all are operating properly? An MDD's power supply unit can get really hot, and if even one of its two cooling fans is broken, the heat will surely build up inside your system.


~Henjie

[Edited on 4-12-2004 by Henjie]

[Eric]

Hi Henjie,

Does your NEC work with the iApps esp iDVD and Finder disk burning w/o tweaking and/or patches?

tia.

eric

[theweatherman]

I'm wondering if one of your MDD's internal cooling fans is broken though. Can you verify that all are operating properly? An MDD's power supply unit can get really hot, and if even one of its two cooling fans is broken, the heat will surely build up inside your system.

Will check on that one. I have always assumed all the internal fans are working. The back of the tower do get hot when I have been working on the machine for a long time, whether I used the optical drives or not. And it is warm even when idle compared to my other machine (a Blue and White upgraded to a G4).

Thanks again.

[Henjie]

Originally posted by Eric
Hi Henjie,

Does your NEC work with the iApps esp iDVD and Finder disk burning w/o tweaking and/or patches?

No official support under Panther (Panther only supports the Pioneer DVR-107D). You have to install a custom driver from LaCie (LaCie uses the NEC ND-2500A for some of its external Firewire DVD burners). The driver's just a simple device profile that you put inside the Library folder so no extreme hacking or anything like that. ;-)

Once the driver is "installed", you'll have iDVD, iTunes, and Finder disc burning support. iDVD still won't burn to DVD+R discs though, so you'll have to use DVD-Rs for your iDVD projects (no such limitation for DVD Studio Pro).

Pros: the NEC ND-2500A's burning quality is superb, better than most 8x DVD burners plus it doesn't mind you feeding it subpar media. It's also cheaper than the Pioneer DVR-107D and Lite-On SOHW-812S.

Cons: it's not the best reader out there although the same can be said for the Pioneer DVR-107D. Tolerance for scratched/dirty discs (especially DVDs) is lower than that of the Lite-On 812S. This is one of the reasons why I bought a 16x Lite-On DVD-ROM for my DVD reading/ripping needs. ;-)


~Henjie