OK i'm trying to get a dell inspiron 1501 with windows vista back to xp. Its my sons old laptop and full of crap which i have deleted etc. However the cd rom which i need to boot from is not recognised in the bis ( ATPI CD ROM NONE) It also doesn't show at all in device manager.
So i removed it and fitted another which was recognised and drivers loaded etc etc. The drive bay light flashes when the door is closed and will eject ok as well. BUT still not rcognised in the bios or device manager.

The old drive however does function etc ok in the laptop i am on just now?????? no problems
Please help as the laptop i am on just now which has been tempremental with the BSOD and i was hoping this one of my sons which is quicker/better would be the answer.

is the caddy faulty? Or the pins on the laptop side? Could be a loose IDE cable or whatever the laptop equivilent is of that age.

Update time.

Still no dvd drive despite flashing the bios and reloading all drivers/software.
Xp installed to sp3 and all systems go apart from dvd drive. Everything else is just fine and machine is a lot quicker as well.

The symptons of the dvd are
From switching on the machine the drawer will power open and closed. You can then put in a disc. The light flashes for say 5 or 6 secs and the drive spins up then "click sound " and nothing happens no drawer opening or anything.

If you remove the drive before switching on, the machine boots up fine. Then while powered on insert the drive. It lights up etc as before and switches off BUT this time you can power the drive open and closed as much as you want ( the light flashes but still trips out) but you can keep on trying to open and close the drawer.


At no time however does it show up in the bios or my computer or hardware manager at all. The drive does work in another machine though no problem.
Its almost like the drive is being turned off/disabled after a set time.

What do we think?? time for an external drive??