Help: 3 Problems

[Monster_AMD]

Hey guys,
1. I bought an Athlon 64 3000 + Asus A8N E + Leadtek 6600 (256MB) some 15 days back. Because of some reasons my vendor could not provide me my actual config. So he gave me MSI RS480 and an LG DVD RW for a few days. Now he has replaced the old standby config with original one. I asked for Sony DRU 800 model but he has given me DW Q28A. I never heard of this model. He says its latest and has same specs and features as DRU 800. Plz enlighten me abt this. Should I stick to my demand of the DRU model or keep this one?

2. My friend has a old Sony Vaio lappy. It has Toshiba SD c2402 DVD Combo. It can read cds but cannot read the DVD. The error says "the media contains the format which is not supported by windows." What must be wrong with it?

3. I have a Pinnacle PCTV Pro internal PCI TV card. It worked fine with my old P4 machine. But it is not working with current machine. It says IRQ is not assigned for the device. And device manager displays the conflicts for this model. When I install the card, DVD RW vanishes. I am worried.

4. If at all I need to buy another TV card, I wish to go for a external TV box. It does not require CPU support. Just monitor and the device. It can be used with lappy too. Plz suggest me a good manufacturer for such TV box.

 

[club_pranay]

A2= try reinstalling the DVD player software.
A4= before going for External one, remember that you cannot record audio/video from the cable connection.
Pinnacle, Mercury are amongs the best

 

[AlienTech]

Sony DVD Burners DW-Q28A 16X Sony DVD Writer 4X Dual Layer DVD ...

Hmmm I would go for the LG burner, For 1 it is rs500 cheaper... and second the LG burns disks a whole lot better than the Sony ($47.00)/Liteon ($45.00). And if anything my next choice would be the BenqQ 1640 ($44.00) or Pioneer A109 ($50.99). (+R for benq and -R for Pioneer) depending on which type of disks you can get easier. LG ($49.99) is a DVD-RAM company but it seems to be the only one which can do both well. NEC ($45.00) is good too.

DW-Q28A Dual Layer DVD±RW Writer (16x/8x/16x DVD+RW, 16x/6x/16x DVD-RW, 4x DVD±R DL, 48x/24x/48x CD-RW)
Current Lowest Price: US$47.00
*www.burnworld.com/dvd-burner/sony-dw-q28a.htm

Not familiar with the vaio... But it could be a bad disk. IE a disk with data on it that is confusing the machine. Happens often. But havent seen that error message.

And you can assign an IRQ to USB devices in the Bios. Press the DEL key during startup/reboot and it should take you into it. Some things wont work without an IRQ assigned to the VGA and/or USB.
And you cant get better than the pinnacle...

 

[AlienTech]

All same identical hardware... Not sure why sony always have 2 of the same hardware as different model numbers. The DRU-800A is the fancy retail package which costs more and the DW-Q28A is the OEM package which is much cheaper.
__________________

SOHW-1693S (16x+R, 8x+RW, 4x+R9, 16x-R, 6x-RW, 4x-R9)
LITE-ON DVDRW SOHW-1693S
DVDRW DRW-3S169
SONY DVD RW DRU-800A
SONY DVD RW DW-Q28A

*codeguys.rpc1.org/dvdrw_overview.html