Hello,

I'm trying to update my Smart and Friendly 4424A Speedwriter Plus firmware from 1.18 to 1.40. I've downloaded the firmware upgrade and tried to use it, but it will not upgrade. It never seems to communicate with the drive (drive never lights up as README says it should), it just hangs up. Also, the upgrader was asking for wnaspi32.dll (ASPI layer which I copied from Nero Burning Rom 5.5.10). I don't know why that is, and I wouldn't mind an explanation.

The drive fails performance tests with Smart and Friendly's Disc Inspector. It will not erase RW discs with Nero Burning Rom 5.5.10. Otherwise, the drive works. It burns OK, and reads fine.

The drive is on my secondary IDE channel as Cable Select on the primary (end) connector. My BIOS and Windows 2000 see it as a slave, and Windows 2000 automatically disables DMA for the drive.

I'm interested in finding out how to manually inform the flash updater of the drive's location, if such a thing is possible. I'm also interested in where the flash updater is looking for an ASPI manager. I have ASPI 4.72 installed, but the flash updater doesn't recognize it. It only seems to recognize the wnaspi32.dll driver that I copied from Nero into the flash updater's folder. No other ASPI driver seems to work, even when copied into the flash update's folder.

Thanks for your help.

Are you sure?
Can't see a 4424A, but a 4224A
(NB. There apparently IS a 4424, based (most likely) on a virtually undocumented JVC 4x4x24 mechanism - the loader problems are likely to be the same, but the firmware mentioned later WILL NOT BE - only the 4x2x24 and 2x2x24 share this commonality)

http://tech.smartandfriendly.com/download.htm
I'm amazed that site still exists.

If it's a 4224A, which, I believe, is JVC based
See my rather crummy site
http://www.junkroom.freeserve.co.uk/jvc2080.htm

When my discussion board worked, it transpired that the loader was useless on anything above Win98 (maybe WinME might work) - I believe it was also tried on a "force-aspi'ed" Win2000 with no success.
The 1.40 release (=2.47 on the 2x drive) also proved to have serious problems with DirectCD.

Though I also note, that with the Creative or JVC firmware, maybe under all conditions

*********
The drive's tolerance of CD-RW media is TRULY MISERABLE - with only Traxdata 2x and "maxmax" (later discovered to be 1-4X) working - the money I wasted on samples of others, including a whole 10-box of 2x Princo on my earlier assumption that it did not like "1-4x".

The 4x2x24 and 2x2x24 JVC-based drives both use the same firmware, though there are additional variants
2080 (tez) and 2082 (tet) - only the id changes
2224 (trw) more differences

If you hold the eject button at powerup, the drive assumes the JVC bootloader identity (for both 2x and 4x, this is the W2080 bootloader)
On the next norm,al power cycle, bootloader mode is cancelled, and the current or reloaded firmware re-engages, this is ideal for bad-flash recovery.

I must update it sometime - actually have a considerable amount semi-prepared, but rather lost interest when I got a better drive.

(in reply to hammmy)

To be honest, I'm not terribly sure that the drive IS a 4424A. That's how my ECS K7S5A BIOS and Win2K identify it. I plan to yank the drive and try the update in a Win98 machine, so hopefully I'll be able to better identify it while I have it out.

I actually found your page during my initial troubleshooting. Good stuff there.

I have been using 4X 80min/700MB CD-RW gold discs branded as COMPUSA, which is a computer/electronics retailer (not sure if they are national). I don't know which OEM they are from. I don't recall ever having the erase function work, but I'm not sure. I use Memorex 80min/700MB CD-R green discs, and have no complaints in that department.

Thanks for the info regarding the eject button. Hopefully I'll get the update to work under Win98.

(in reply to hammmy)

**STOP**

If it IS the 4424 (writes to 1-4x CD-RW at 4x) then it's a JVC 4424 mechanism, and 1.18 is the LATEST firmware
http://www.cendyne.com/download_list.asp?Download_category=Firmware
The Cendyne CDI CD 00017 4x4x24 IDE Internal CD-RW is the only other common rebrand of that rare JVC model.

The 1.40 you have is probably WRONG!

(in reply to hammmy)

Thanks Matthew, for the post and the email. I didn't notice that the firmware upgrade was for 4224 instead of 4424.

I'll still verify that the drive is/is not a 4424. Thanks for the help.

(in reply to hammmy)

In addition: I can't remember RW drive which can be flashed when you use "cabel select" instead of set master or slave mode!
I'm not right, am I?

(in reply to hammmy)