Posted: 11/14/2005 10:26:43 PM EDT
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Disclaimer: I know virtually nothing about how or why a computer works at all. I have an e machine running XP with an AMD 64 2.0Ghz processor and 512MB ram. Model #T6212. The thing has a 48x CD-Rom and 16x double layer DVD+/-RW. When I bought this computer it was lightening fast with zero issues. I import alot of music onto i-Tunes and was getting consistent 24x import times. It would burn a 20 song AIFF music CD in a minute 12 seconds. It was a rocket. Here's the wierd part. Anything put into the CD or DVD drive wether it be a music CD, DVD movie, Data CD or whatever has slowly degraded to the point where niether drive works at all now. This degragation took place in about a two month time period. Now when not running the drives the computer is still rocket fast. But put in a music CD and as soon as the drive starts spinning up the computer slows to a crawl. Click on a window and there is about a 7 second delay. Meanwhile the drive continues to speed up slow down speed up slow down. Take the CD or DVD out and the computer returns to normal speed and behavior. What seems so strange to me is it doesn't matter if I use the CD drive or the DVD drive the results are the same. Any Ideas????? Thanks James |
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The computer is trying to read the drives not doing well and that is tying up the computer and slowing it down Could be a bad drive(s) or a bad IDE controller. It could be one of the drives is bad and they are both on the same IDE controller and the bad drive is causing both drives to fail to read the disc. I would suggest that you remove both the CD and DVD drive. The reinstall the CD drive with put in a known good CD disc and see what happens. Then remove the CD drive reinstall the DVD drive and put in a known good CD disc and see what happens. That will help narrow the possibilities. |
Did it not power up at all? Or was there an error message when you tried to turn the computer on? |
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I've seen similar behavior from bad drives before. You say that when both questionable drives are disconnected, the system still won't boot up? That's strange. But not terribly suprising from E-Machines, as they are pretty low on the quality scale. Sorry. If I get a chance later today, I'll check my diagnostic book, if someone hasn't beat me to it by then (have to go to work)... |
| This may or may not be related to the problems you have, but were any of the music CD's you put into your drive published by Sony? The reason I ask is because many of the Sony music CD's have a software to deal anti-pirating. This stuff can really mess up your computer. Read more about the Sony Rootkit. |
+1 More then sony's CDs will try to install software on your machine. How do you defeat this evil technology? Hold the shift key for about 30 seconds after inserting a CD or DVD. However, this won't help you if it already installed on your machine. -Foxxz |
The computer power comes on and the screen shows a large "e" with a prompt to either hit F2 or F10 for BIOS and something else. This is normal when I first start the machine, however that is as far as it goes and I can't access either menu by pressing the F keys. So basically it just locks up there and the only thing I can do is unplug the power cord. |
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Did you unplug the IDE ribbon cable at each CD/DVD drive or simply pulled it off the motherboard? If you pulled it off the MB (that's the big circuit board in the computer case) then you also disabled your hard drive and the computer will not boot. Since you have the giant E machine logo covering up any error messages you can't tell. Fritz |
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Generally the drive won't fail unless you have used it a whole lot. If the IDE controller fails nothing connected to it will work at all.
-Seconded. Dirty CD-drive optics can cause this very problem. Have you ever cleaned them? If not, get a brush-style cleaner CD and a can of air and play the brush-CD, then puff a bit of air in there. ~ |
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Voting for IDE controller or driver. I had the wrong IDE driver for my CD and DVD drives and my machine would come to a halt when it attempted to read a DVD. Turned out that the nVidia drivers that I had were crap so I had to use the plain-jane microsoft EIDE driver. |