Macworld: Internal CD-RW drive in 6500 ...

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10 Replies Last post: Sep 12, 2003 11:54 AM by lemac

bottomline5

166 posts since
Jul 18, 2002

Aug 6, 2003 6:37 AM

Internal CD-RW drive in 6500

I have a power mac 6500 and my external CD-RW drive is on the fritz, so I am looking for an inexpesive replacement. Can I just pull out my internal CD-ROM drive and replace it with a CD-RW drive? Is there a certain brand I need to get, or will anything work? Has anyone tried this on a 6500?

________________________________________ 20" Aluminum iMac 2.0 Ghz, Mac Mini G4 1.42 Ghz

lemac

868 posts since
Jul 24, 2003

1. Aug 6, 2003 8:09 AM

in response to: bottomline5

Re: Internal CD-RW drive in 6500

Is this a firewire or a scsi external burner? I believe that the 6500's internal cd-rom drive is SCSI. Most drives for sale these days are IDE/ATAPI. If you want to replace the internal drive with a burner, you have to search around a bit (a SCSI 50 pin). You might also want to try going to xlr8yourmac.com and look at their drive compatibility matrix once you found a model.

bottomline5

166 posts since
Jul 18, 2002

2. Aug 6, 2003 10:51 AM

in response to: lemac

Re: Internal CD-RW drive in 6500

The drive that crapped out is actually an Iomega USB external drive (attached by way of a PCI USB card). Thanks for the tip about the drive compatibility chart, I'll go check it out.

________________________________________ 20" Aluminum iMac 2.0 Ghz, Mac Mini G4 1.42 Ghz

lemac

868 posts since
Jul 24, 2003

3. Aug 6, 2003 4:01 PM

in response to: bottomline5

Re: Internal CD-RW drive in 6500

Finding a good SCSI burner that is fully compatible might be tough. I wish you good luck. Keep in mind however, that you can probably get a firewire card and a firewire external burner (a model that is much faster then your current one to boot) for as low as $100. Firewire cards can be found for as low as 30 dollars and older model burners for 70. I don't know your set up though, it's possible that you have both your pci slots filled.

Seele

26 posts since
May 4, 2001

4. Aug 9, 2003 10:32 AM

in response to: lemac

Re: Internal CD-RW drive in 6500

Lemac,

I feel sure that the 6500 cannot take a FireWire card; the architecture doesn't support it at all; that's the reason for me to sell mine! However, getting a SCSI CD-R or CD-RW drive, pre-owned perhaps, and put into an enclosure would be a better way to go.

It sound strange that you found SCSI CD-R and CD-RW drives lacking in compatibility; Toast has no problem at all recognizing any of the drives I have tried so far.

From where I stand it would be a better plan to get a SCSI CD-R or CD-RW drive and put it in an external SCSI box, both of these are going very inexpensively nowadays (for the record I just built two out of LaCie boxes with Teac and Panasonic mechanisms for US$60). For my money I would not really rely on USB for CD burning anyway.

But if your USB enclosure is still working and you are still comfortable with it, you might also be considering getting an IDE burner to fit into it, but you have to know that you will never get the full speed of the burner: I would think that the USB would limit the burn speed at about 4X, on a good day.

lemac

868 posts since
Jul 24, 2003

5. Aug 9, 2003 11:06 AM

in response to: Seele

Re: Internal CD-RW drive in 6500

I understand your concern about the 6500 not being able to take Firewire cards. I had a 6400 with a similar issue. However, it turns out that some Firewire cards drain too much juice from the slots, and that's why they don't work in our machines. Sonnet's card does work with these models.

As for SCSI drive compatibility, some internal SCSI drives don't support booting or Apple's burning software (in particular, iTunes). I'm sure that you wouldn't want that for your internal, primary CD drive. No problems with external SCSI drives, but with the going rate for those, you could have a faster Firewire model. I highly recommend not using USB for cd burning. It's just too slow and flakey.

bottomline5

166 posts since
Jul 18, 2002

6. Aug 12, 2003 11:54 AM

in response to: lemac

Re: Internal CD-RW drive in 6500

Thanks for all your advice. I am hoping to find an internal scsi drive that is bootable, and I think I found one that will work for about $50. According to some research I have done, there is an HP model that fits the bill. It doesn't matter so much to me if it doesn't work with iTunes as I am accustomed to using toast. I am looking for a cheap reliable fix until I save up enough to buy my G5 next year, and for the reasons mentioned in posts above, don't plan on going back to a USB drive. I'll let y'all know how everything comes out.

________________________________________ 20" Aluminum iMac 2.0 Ghz, Mac Mini G4 1.42 Ghz

bottomline5

166 posts since
Jul 18, 2002

7. Sep 9, 2003 7:39 AM

in response to: bottomline5

Re: Internal CD-RW drive in 6500

Well, I located an internal scsi drive, installed it in my 6500, and it works fine! All for $58 + shipping.

Interestingly, the audio output on the Apple drive was not compatible with the audio out on the HP cd writer that I installed. However, the CD player plays CDs normally without the audio out connection hooked up. It reads CD's and reads and writes CDR's, and CDRW's nicely, and boots from my OS 9 CD.

I have not tried installing Apple's cd burning software, but it works fine with toast. I may try to install the apple software in the near future when I get a little time.

The biggest problem I ran into was getting the CD door to line up with the hole in the 6500's case. The door on the HP drive is slightly larger than the one on the Apple CD ROM drive, and when the drive is installed on the little sled that clips it into the computer, it sits slightly higher than the door on the apple drive in relation to the opening. I solved the problem by switching the doors on the two drives - however now there is a small gap in the door leading into the drive when it is closed, leading me to believe that I may experience problems with dust buildup over time. I may make some modification to the CD drive's original door so that it will open and shut without letting dust in.

The other special modification I had to do was to shave a little plastic off the button on the outside of the case that pushes the eject button on the CD burner. It's hard to picture without seeing it, but the button on the case pushes the CD burner's eject button continuously. I shaved a little plastic off the 6500's eject-button-pushing mechanism and it works fine now.

Thanks to all for your input and suggestions.

________________________________________ 20" Aluminum iMac 2.0 Ghz, Mac Mini G4 1.42 Ghz

lemac

868 posts since
Jul 24, 2003

8. Sep 11, 2003 10:15 AM

in response to: bottomline5

Re: Internal CD-RW drive in 6500

The audio cable isn't THAT important. You can get around the issue by ripping the cd tracks to mp3s (via iTunes or whatever).

bottomline5

166 posts since
Jul 18, 2002

9. Sep 12, 2003 11:37 AM

in response to: lemac

Re: Internal CD-RW drive in 6500

Actually, CDs play just fine without having to convert to MP3. I just click on the CD's icon in iTunes, press the play button, and off she goes. Makes me wonder why they bother putting those audio output cables on there at all.

________________________________________ 20" Aluminum iMac 2.0 Ghz, Mac Mini G4 1.42 Ghz

lemac

868 posts since
Jul 24, 2003

10. Sep 12, 2003 11:54 AM

in response to: bottomline5

Re: Internal CD-RW drive in 6500

Some cd drives need that audio pass thru cable to play music. I guess not all drives need it (or it could be because it's scsi, all the drives i've used have been IDE).

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Aug 6, 2003 6:37 AM

Internal CD-RW drive in 6500

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