help getting SCSI CD burner running in Tiger?

[tyler2342]

Hi. Thanks in advance for your help.

I recently upgraded my trusty old PCI-bus ("Yikes") G4 to Tiger. The old girl just keeps on going! So far everything is great except I can't get my PlexWriter 12/4/32 external CD burner to work. I don't want to junk it b/c it is really a super reliable burner.

Now the Plextor drives come with auto termination and that had been working fine up thru 10.2.8. But I read somewhere that Tiger is finicky about SCSI bus termination so I wasn't surprised when the machine wouldn't fully boot when the burner was on (or under some circumstances it would boot and then require a restart after a minute or so).

So today I picked up a passive terminator and tried that. It's worse, an earlier hang than I've yet seen. Ay caramba! So, the first question: do I need an active terminator?

Some particulars: I do have the most recent firmware for the burner. It runs on a SCSI bus controller in a PCI slot. It's HD 50-pin SCSI if that matters.

The obvious questions I come to are: active terminator as opposed to passive? Or is the problem with the PCI/SCSI controller?

Any thoughts are most welcome. I will gladly provide any relevant details. Thanks again.

 

[Ric]

Hi there and welcome !

It's been a while since I've had a play with Voodoo SCSI chains ;-)

I wouldn't expect any harm to come from using an Active Terminator...

I'll have a dig around and see what I can come up with !

regards

Ric

 

[tyler2342]

Thanks for your help, or at least attempted help. I'll definitely trade up from passive to an active terminator on Monday, seems like the next thing to try.

I do have open Firewire. I wonder if a FW>SCSI adapter might work when the PCI>SCSI doesn't. But I don't want to waste too much money trying every kind of adapter if the real problem is just that Tiger hates SCSI.

I swear, if this burner weren't so incredibly reliable I'd just Craigslist the thing and get a FW replacement. But I'd hate to ditch a nice Plextor drive without making every effort to keep it running.

I'm looking forward to seeing if you can come up with any leads. Thanks again.

 

[Ric]

Hi there,

how did the Active terminator work ?

regards

Ric