I have an old 486/66DX2 with no CD-ROM. I was given a working Mitsumi 2X CD-ROM, but when I attach it and power on the machine, it will not boot. In fact, it won't even go through Power-On Self Test, it quits before the memory is counted. Unplug the CD0ROM, and everything works just fine. I thought POST was independent of periphery, the CPU shouldn't even know the cd-rom exists yet, right? So how can the cd-rom interfere with it?

Larry If my memory serves me isnt the mitsumi 2X a 30 pin drive. If it is and you have it connected to the floppie cable this will cause your machine to freeze. This drive as well as the sony were add ons to the sound card. The best thing I can tell you is and I know you may not want to hear it is that these drives are a real pain to setup because you need to get the sound card as well as the drive to work together and the proper drivers are needed as well. Most likely if this is the case than that is why your machine wont boot. If im wrong and it is a 40 pin atapi drive than check your pin out asignement on the drive as well as the motherboard. Every thing the cable the IDE port and the drive must all be connected to pin 1 and the harddrive must be jumpered to master and the cd-rom to slave. John

i have the same problem and the drive is a 40 pin ide i was looking for the pin out for the cable i know that you can turn a part of the cable over and make it work but i can not find the pin out can you help me john

just want to say that on ide cables the red stripe should always match up to pin one on the motherboard and the drive. My computer would not boot or give a post code when i had the cable reversed. I corrected the cable and it boots until it gets to the cd-rom, then i stops and says 'not atapi compatible press F1' but the manual clearly says it IS atapi

i have the same CD-ROM mentioned above ,but i need the files to get the sound card to work and i do not know the name of it because it came with the mitsumi cd-rom

you will need the sound card that goes with this cd-rom . i think it used an azteck sound card with the cd-rom interface (plug in) on it . windows 95 and 98 will detect these 2 units and install the drivers for you . if you don't have the right sound card , try EBAY auctions .....good luck