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Do I need a new External SCSI CD Drive?

PostPosted: Sun May 10, 2009 5:23 pm
by tom2323
Hi all,
This is my first post. here, so forgive the lack of familiarity.
I bought an E4Xturbo (non Ultra) with 128 mg RAM 2 years ago.
I'm just getting around 9second atte,pt) to get it running & and integrated into the home setup I'm putting together.

As part of this, I bought I group of original unopened EMU CD's.
I'd bought a Yamaha SCSI CD reader to load the cards.
My computer is a Mac (no PC's in the house).

I am running EOS 3.20b
With each disk, when I attempt to load the first bank. the progress bar stars & gets to 5% then abruptly stops, & I'm looking at the main screen, as if I just turned the unit on.
If I choose the second or ANY other bank, the progress bar moves along to 100% , the bank load and can be accessed. :roll:

Since the CD Rom, a Yamaha an older SCSI unit with centronics connectors was bought separately, I'm not sure if there's something wrong with the CD Rom unit.

My question is what CD Rom brands will work with an EMU e4XT non ultra (if I need a new one)?
Will any SCSI CD ROM drive work or does it have to be one or two particular brands? I see external LaCie's , Plextors, yamahas, & Apple branded units on ebay.

In the past I found that "PC SCSI compatible" and "Mac SCSI compatible" are NOT the same, when working with the Mac.
What type of system is the EMU EOS similar to? Or will ANY SCSI CD Rom Drive work?

Also, does anyone have an idea of what might be going wrong in the first place, if it isn't the CD drive?

I'd like to upgrade the EOS, but first I have to figure out if the E4XT is worth the hassle, people keep saying "just get an ultra, they have a differnet motherboard & use ide drives, so no scsi issues.

help? :shock:
Thank very much in advance, and I'm reading the manual (confusing :cry: ) as fast as a can. I don't even know how much pertains because the SCSI units are not supported by EMU and tech support didn't even want to talk to me about it!!!
Tom

Re: Do I need a new External SCSI CD Drive?

PostPosted: Sun May 10, 2009 5:48 pm
by kalide
Sounds like termination problem. See elsewhere on this board for about a million posts on the topic or look at tweakheadz.com for more details :-)

E4XT is Ultra btw.

IDE is only for hard drives - you are doing the right thing with SCSI CD ROMs - most will work especially if they are from the mid 90's. Some compatible drives listed on emu.com support section for legacy samplers.

M

Re: Do I need a new External SCSI CD Drive?

PostPosted: Mon May 11, 2009 8:29 am
by tom2323
Hmmmm,
Ok. I'll check out all the references you suggested.
I was told by the tech, that the fact that it had a SCSI internal HD & SCSI centronics connetors external meant it was not considered an ultra, just an E4X Turbo. They were very clear about that.
There is no "Ultra" printed on the faceplate, and the motherboard is different. I actually bought the e-synth Rom chip and discovered that the Rom will not fit in the socket.

I was told the redesigned motherboard for the ide version was the first Ultra and the only one that could accept the esynth upgrade... the chips literally sit in a different area of the board and are slightly different in configuration. I nearly broke it trying to put it in.
As I said, they would discuss only the ide ultra versions and not the SCSI which are now unsupported. After a bit of complaining, I was given some help, begrudgingly. I was also told NOT to mess with any EOS much above 3.20. There were stability issues with the older EMU's (mine) and the 4.x.x EOS.
One thing for sure they just wanted to get me off the phone. "Just buy an Ultra... they're less trouble". that's a quote.
eek?
Tom

Re: Do I need a new External SCSI CD Drive?

PostPosted: Mon May 11, 2009 1:44 pm
by kalide
Ah. So its an E4 classic series. Then you are stuck with scsi except for using a scsi-ide bridge (eg acard 7720).

Lots of posts here (search) on that topic.

Search on Acard

M

Re: Do I need a new External SCSI CD Drive?

PostPosted: Mon May 11, 2009 5:43 pm
by fatbenelton
I'm not saying that the drive is the problem but I had problems getting a Yamaha drive to work and they aren't on the list of approved drives on the legacy pages of the EMU website. It would sometimes 'see' the files (also EMU CDs) and start loading but never completed. I bought an old Apple CD300e SCSI drive and the EMU CD's loaded without a hitch straightaway. So, it might be another problem but it might be worth trying to ebay a cheap SCSi drive.

Re: Do I need a new External SCSI CD Drive?

PostPosted: Mon May 11, 2009 5:56 pm
by fatbenelton
Here's the list


http://www.emu.com/support/compatibilit ... atinum.pdf

Bear in mind it's not exhaustive and hasn't been updated for years.

Jon