If any other Quicksilver G4 owners are using a hardware IDE RAID card (i.e. Acard AHARD or Sonnet Tempo RAID - not the VST cards or others using Softraid), let me know your experiences.
I asked the reader to check the card's firmware version also (using Apple System Profiler) in case there's a later version available from Sonnet or Acard. Sonnet's Tempo RAID66 product page doesn't list Quicksilver G4 models as compatible, but that may be due to the page not being updated since summer MWNY when the new models were released. Sonnet does not list any Tempo RAID66 firmware updates at their site but Acard shows a v1.39 firmware download for the AHARD RAID card (same card as the Temp RAID66) on their support page. However the reader's RAID card may already have that version installed since the files are dated October 2000.

" I checked the drive database and there don't appear to be any reviews of this drive yet, hence my long-windedness. If you need any more info let me know.
CRW2200S-VK 20X Write/10X ReWrite/40X Read

Just got 2 of these as replacements for older Yamaha CDRWs that died. For those who weren't aware of this, Yamaha will sell you a new drive at a reduced price if your CDRW dies after the 1 year warranty expires (in Canada they will, anyway). I was told I would be receiving a pair of 2100S drives so was surprised when these showed up instead.

The 2200S-VK is an ATAPI drive which comes with a 50 pin SCSI-3 bridge (maybe an OEMed ACard IDE-->SCSI bridge? I can send pics of it if you want). Cool idea as long as it works...

A large Philips screw secures the SCSI bridge to the chassis of the CDRW. The bridge requires power - a Y cable to facilitate this was included in the package. The SCSI bridge adds a tiny bit of length to the CDRWs but they still fit OK in my external SCSI cases.

Though the retail box drives I received indicate only Windows support, the drive is recognised by Toast 5 as a CRW2200S.

I tested the drives with a G4/400 AGP (OS 9.1), 576MB RAM (Adaptec 2906 PCI SCSI card) and with a PowerBook G3 FireWire, 1GB RAM (Adaptec PowerDomain 1480 cardbus SCSI card). I also swapped the drive (sans SCSI adapter) with the stock ATAPI DVD drive in my G4/400 AGP. Works just as well on the IDE bus.

Burn Speed:
Wow! 4 minutes for a full CD. 20X burns completed without problems on the G4. The CDRW has 8MB of cache and I gave Toast 64MB RAM cache. On the PowerBook G3 FireWire the 20X option was not selectable, I had 16x max. I suppose Toast determined that the SCSI bus on the PowerBook couldn't sustain the 20X burn rate.

Disc Burner Support:
Not yet. Using Forker with ResEdit I nosed around in the data fork of the YamahaCDR Authoring Support File. The newest drive listed is the CRW2100. Disc Burner support is not important to me - I'll wait for an update rather than attempting to edit the data fork.

Bootability:
I couldn't boot from the drive in SCSI mode. The Adaptec SCSI cards might not be capable of this (not sure about this, maybe one of your readers will know if these models are bootable). I did manage to boot from the drive in ATAPI mode through selecting a CD in the Startup Disk Control Panel but not by the keyboard 'C' key method.

The ability to convert the drive between SCSI and ATAPI would make it a good choice for anyone who has an older (SCSI) PowerMac but is planning to upgrade to a newer machine. If you need a CDRW that is compatible with Disc Burner you'll have to wait for the inevitable update.

Hope you find this review helpful. Thanks for publishing a great site.
"Pat J.

Detailed reports are appreciated (the more info and tests run the better). There are some reports on the IDE only version of the drive (2200 model) but don't think there were any. Although Pat selected IDE to SCSI Adapter as the interface, I duplicated his entry to post it under SCSI interface also, since that is what many will search for to find a list of SCSI interface drives.

Drive Type: DVD-R + DVD-RAM
Drive Brand/model: Panasonic LF-D311
System: Powerbook G3 2000 running OS 9.2
Comments:
" I just purchased the Panasonic Rambo drive from ESBUY.com for $535 w/free shipping. It's a DVD-RAM/R drive. I ordered it barebone and put it in a Pyro firewire case. 1st off, the drive didn't want to boot my laptop, I even tried to have it boot my G4/450 desktop running 9.1, but to no avail. I then tried playing regular data CDs. They worked. I put in a DVD. It worked... (after disabling iTunes & firewire authorizing extentions).

I then tried using a DVD-RAM disc. It worked! I tried using iDVD 1.0 to see if it'll see it... Yes, it did, but only as a RAM drive. I then inserted a DVD-R media. It didn't recognize it. iDVD didn't recognize it as a DVD-R burner. I then replaced my regular DVD drive from my desktop machine with this Rambo drive. The Apple System Profiler only recognized it as a DVD-RAM drive. NOT the DVD-R that it also is...

I tried using Toast Titanium 5.02, but to NO avail. I even called Roxio, and they said that they don't support RAMBO drives. I checked the site in which I purchased it, and they only had software for the PC... neoDVD. I couldn't find any software for the Mac that will make it be seen as a RAM/R drive in which it is. Mike, have you tried this, or hear any stories of this RAMBO drive. I guess right now, I'll just keep it for the time being and see if someone will add support for it with the Macintosh...
Zakee Abdurrasheed"

I've not tried this drive and this is the first report I think of it (unless someone entered a report under DVD-R drive type). Update: Another owner of this drive posted a database entry on that said the beta version of Toast for OS X worked with the drive.

"Okay, here goes. I love this drive, pure and simple. I installed to replace my dead DVD-R drive [G4/AGP system] when I had to do a re-install of my OS. The drive worked perfect first time, boots in 9.1, installed OS X from it, works great in either OS to burn CD's (OS X requires either iTunes or Toast, iTunes limited to burning audio CD's). This drive is extremely fast! I am used to a 12X and the 16X speed on this is amazing, about 5 min to burn an entire CD, awesome.

I have had one MAJOR problem. After I upgraded to OS 9.2 my system would not finish booting with the apple cd/dvd driver, it did not matter if I had a disc in the drive or not, it would lock up tight when that driver was present in the extension folder. It eventually got worse, but I did track it down at one point to the driver, tried everything, i could think of (and I am a computer/network support consultant for a living) but I could not get my system to work with the driver installed. I was able to get it to work "fine" but only if I took out the drive.

So I would have to say that this drive is NOT compatible with OS 9.2 unless there is a firmware upgrade or different driver available. I even tried downgradeing the dvd/cd driver to the OS 9.1 version, 9.2 did not like that at all!

Other than that, this drive has been everything I've wanted in a CD-RW, though it is loud as heck!
Louis D. "

(Although Louis noted it didn't work for him, a reader on Tuesday noted that his Yamaha 2100 problems with OS 9.2.1 were fixed by using the OS 9.1 CD/DVD extension.) Several comments here on this drive noted it's loud. And the 2100 only burns at 16x on the outer 1/3 of the disc (unlike the TDK, Plextor, Liteon, etc. drives that are constant 16x burners). Plus they have burn-proof, another plus. But mac compatibility varies (booting, itunes, etc. support).

I think the FAQ lists a source of Yamaha 2100 firmware updates (and a tip on applying them since there's no mac IDE flasher from yamaha). This was noted in the past news and several readers said it worked (the IDE flash tip). The IDE articles page, CDRW section also has the tip/feedback page on this. May not help with the OS 9.2 issue however - and your drive may have the latest firmware already. (Also note if firmware updates fail during the process, the drive could be rendered useless.)

" After spending MONTHS trying to get VPN To work on my G4 400/AGP I finally succeeded a few months ago using NTS Tunnelbuilder and Dave software. I was happy as could be that I finally managed to crack the secret code to get into our corporate network. Everything worked great.

After upgrading to 9.2.1 I can no longer VPN into the corp network. The NTS client never makes a connection. I am suspecting the Open Transport components but have not had time to downgrade just the component and try yet. Will keep you updated.
C. Posey "

If anyone else has had similar problems let me know.

Reader Feedback and Tips:

" The problem may be related to Dave not the open transport. I was using Dave to talk to my PC network under OSX. If I let classic mode start up, all the Dave shares used to work under OSX. After updating to 9.2.1 that no longer works. It still works if I boot into 9.2.1 natively, though it's painfully slower than it used to be. I suspect that something in the way 9.2.1 works with Dave has changed enough to break it completely under OSX, and hobble it under 9.2.1.
Eric W. "

" TunnelBuilder works fine with 9.2.1. You have to reinstall TunnelBuilder after system upgrades (most of the time) because of how it is integrated into Open Transport.
Rick "

I seem to remember this being noted before (having to reinstall some networking software after an OS update).

" Using TunnelBuilder on OS9.2.1. No problems so far.
Noam "

(Umax clone running OS 9.1. Specific Umax model not mentioned but his previous entries noted an S900.)
" I am happy with the Lite-On drive so far. It burned a 600MB data CD in about 4 minutes and 10 seconds with burnproof on.

I have the drive connected via an Acard ATA100+ PCI card. It is connected as a primary drive. CDROM mounted fine just with Apple CD/DVD extension, but also worked with Toast 5 CD extension. I used Toast 5.0.2 for the burn, seemed to be working fine so far. I have no luck with either iTunes or Disc Burner so far. iTunes does not recognize my burner and Disc Burner refused to install with the message that my computer was not supported. It was interesting to note that Authoring Support 1.1.2 also refused to install with the message that "installation required a computer with builtin USB port". My Umax has a Sonnet Tango Firewire/USB card.

Overall, I am pleased with the Lite-On/Acard combo so far. I was a bit worried that it wouldn't work as previous reposts suggested that the ATA66 Acard didn't seemed to work too well with CDRW.

By the way, the drive may be bootable, but I still need time to work it out. I tried booting up with a Norton Systemworks CDROM. I got the as far as a flashing floppy disk icon with a "?". I ejected the Norton CD and inserted another bootable CDROM, but it still showed the same flashing "?" icon. I have to investigate further before I can say if it was bootable or not.

Oh, and I was using Toast 5.0.2. I downloaded the update and installed it from Roxio site. Btw, you don't really need to register with Toast to downlaod. I have previously registered with Toast 3. After I entered my login name and password (from the previous registration), I got to the Toast 5.0.2 update page without any problem.
Roland Lim "

DVD-R + DVD RAM Drive Reports:
• Firewire (IDE drive in Pyro Case) Panasonic Rambo DVD-R/DVD RAM drive (used with PB G3 2000)
  
  DVD RAM Drive Reports:
• IDE Panasonic LF-D233 (slotted) in Dual G4
  
  Combo DVD/CDRW Drive Reports:
• IDE HP 9900 CI in G4/AGP (Quicksilver)
  
  IDE CDRW Reports:
• Lite-On LTR-16101B (16/10/40) in Umax (didn't note model) using IDE PCI Card (Acard ATA/100)
  (Lite-On reports filed under "other Brands")
• Lite-on 16/10/40 in Beige G3
• Matshita UJDA330 in 2001 iBook (required mods for side cover)
• NEC NR-7700A 12x/10x/32x in B&W G3
  (listed under "other Brands")
• Sony CRX140E/CH2 in B&W G3 (drive sleep problems noted)
• Sony CRX 160EA1 in G4/AGP
• Que 24X10X40 in Beige G3 (postive)
• Que 24X10X40 in Beige G3 (some errors noted)
• Yamaha CRW2100EZ (16/10/40) in G4/AGP
  (noted issues after updating to OS 9.2)
  
  Expansion Bay CDRW Reports:
• Matshita ujda330 in PowerBook G3 2000
  
  Firewire CDRW Drive Reports:
• Que 24/10/40 (IDE) in ADS Pyro FW Case (used w/slotted iMac)
• Que QPS-525 with Beige G3 (using digital origin FW PCI Card)
  (problems noted)
• Yamaha 16x/10x/40x used w/G4 AGP
  
  SCSI CDRW Drive Reports:
• Philips 3600 in 8500
  (problems noted after burns)
• Yamaha CRW-2200S-VK 20/10/40 in G4/AGP (w/2906 SCSI card)
• Yamaha CRW6416SX (6x4x16) external (used w/8500)
  
  SCSI CDROM Drive Reports:
• Pioneer DR-506S 32X Slot Loading in PowerWave
  
  DVD ROM Drive Reports:
• IDE Matshita SR-8185 in iMac slot loading
  
  IDE Hard Drive Reports:
• IBM Travelstar 48GB in PB G3 wallstreet2
  (no mention if it had the magnetic sleep sensor issue noted with previous travelstars in wallstreets mentioned in my Wallstreet illustrated HD upgrade guide.)
• IBM Travelstar 30GB in PB G3 2000
  (There's an illustrated guide to PB G3 Firewire hard drive upgrades here also)
• Quantum Fireball AS 20GB in iMac
• Toshiba 20GB (notebookd drive) in 20th Anniversary Mac
  (includes long comments on the install)
• Western Digital 100GB in Beige G3
  (used my 1998 Beige G3 HD Upgrade Guide)
  
  SCSI Hard Drive Reports:
• IBM 18GB w/8500
• Seagate ST318417N 18GB in 7300/180

You can find full owner reports by searching the database by drive/brand/interface/mac models (the latest reports are shown first in searches).
If you've added a IDE, SCSI, Firewire or USB hard drive, CDRW, tape drive, etc. make sure you add a report to the database. [If you post an updated entry - make sure you use the same name, etc. as you did before so I can find your past entry. Thanks.]

• Apple OEM G3/300 ZIF in Beige G3 (rated 10)
• Newer Tech G3/500 in PowerTower Pro 200 (rated 10)
• Other World Computing G3/500 in Beige G3 (rated 9)
• Powerlogix G4/450 in 7600/120 (rated 9)
• XLR8 CarrierZIF w/G3 333 ZIF in 7500/100 (rated 9)
• B&W G3/300 OC report (no go)

(Warning - Overclocking may not be reliable and could lead to hardware failure or corrupted data.) You can find the full reports by searching the database selecting the indicated Mac model and upgrade card brand/type. If you've upgraded the CPU on your Mac, please post an entry in the database. Search the database for entries from most every upgradable Mac model *before* you buy. (Searchable by mac model/upgrade brand). For detailed reviews with performance tests and install tips, see the CPU Upgrades page.)

• 1 year ago today [11th, 10th was a Sunday]
• 2 years ago today
• 3 years ago today

Software Updates:
• Diablo II LOD 1.09B update
• CodeWarrior for Mac OS, Professional Edition Version 7.0
  
  OS X Software
• Tinker Tool 2.0
• Super Get Info 1.0.2
• Keyspan USB to Serial Drivers

Apple TIL Updates: [nothing found today]

Mac/PowerPC Related News:
(Note: Rehashing of press releases, repeated news, etc. not listed)

• Coolest Notebook In the World [PB G4] (mobilecomputing)
• Lind Electronics Releases New Small-Lightweight Auto/Air DC Power Adapter for Apple Computer's iBooks and Titanium G4 Series Laptops (businesswire)
• Apple Core of Ailing PC Sector (motley fool)
• Pay Hall of Shame & Fame Class of 2001: Graef Crystal (bloomberg)
• Easton Apple Store Opening (the peatgroup)
• MS vs Apple Tech Support Showdown [dated 9/4] (cnet)
• apple student developers (univ mich.)
• Clock speed is not output (zdnet)
• iListen and Mac OS Compatibility (macspeech)
• Red Rooster Internet Cafe (apple)
• Alcohol - laptop fuel of the future (macuser uk)
• Apple China big-wig retires (macworld uk)
• Quark exits UK MacExpo (macworld uk)

Gaming Related:
• Spiderman (activision)
  [as noted last Friday, Aspyr is taking pre-orders on the Mac version)
• Aliens vs Predator goes Gold (macplay)
  [demo released last week - taking pre-orders now.]

Misc. Hardware Related:
• Maxtor Uveils 160GB ATA/133 Hard Drive (extremetech)
• IBM cuts price of tiny [Microdrive] hard drive (cnet)
  [there's a page here from last year on PB compatibility with Microdrives]
• DVpics Digital Video Editing Kit (adaptec)
• DuoConnect (adaptec)
• FireConnect for Notebooks (adaptec)