[Wylug-help] External DVD ROM/CDR-CDRW

[Darran Rimron]

dnoble7 at ukonline.co.uk wrote:

>More help please,
>                 I am wanting to add an external DVD ROM/CDR-CDRW to my
>Mandrake 9.2 box and would appreciate any advice or warnings about
>getting such a drive to work with Linux, also any suggestions as to
>which makes may be most easily accepted.
>                 There would also appear to be the possibility of either a
>complete unit or a caddy plus separate drive unit.  This latter would
>seem to offer more flexibility and I  think this may be preferable.
>
>
One presues USB (and USB2 at that).  I do not know what the recorder
support on USB is like, especially with USBmass-storage moving to its
own device tree (I can't even comment on if that'll be SCSI commandset
based) - that would be worth looking into. Anyone remember the hastle
when Linus dropped ide-scsi support?

Have you considered a USB2SCSI interface, and then an external drive and
caddy - this would be a bit more expensive, but gives you lots of room
to expand[1] and most compatability, generically. (incase you ever get
silly and pimp yourself with CD-tower)

I used to use a PCMCIA2SCSI widget which did great things for an old
laptop I had, until I ran over it (the widget, not the laptop) so can
talk favourably about solutions built around that backbone.

I have given you more questions than answers, but that's not always bad
(honestly) - because atleast when you find "a man that can" - you have
more things to throw at him ;)

-D

[1] cannnot comment on USB2SCSI - again, check for support first