I did flash my drive to Reverse-ATA as you suggested. I have now also flashed using Liggy's 4.24 RPC-1 and bitsetting.

Works a treat.

There is one small problem with Liggy's website description that gave me pause.  His description of the requirement for the drive to be connected as a "Slave" is not necessarily correct!

My Panasonic sees the drive (now flashed to Reverse-ATA) as a Secondary Master.  So he needs to restate the requirement to say that if you're using a version 4.xx firmware now, you can upgrade to 4.24.  Likewise if you're using a working 2.xx version you can upgrade to any of the version 2.xx fw you see there, regardless of whether your drive is seen as a Master or Slave because that may vary from laptop to laptop!

Mike

(in reply to southgate)

quote:

ORIGINAL: MikeG
Hi;

You may have seen this posted somewhere else before but a NEC 6100A is the OEM version of the NEC 6500A retail drive. The same drive.

Your problem is not that your drive doesn't work, but that it doesn't recognise certain types of media. There is no conceivable reason you couldn't flash to one of the Dangerous Brothers versions of the firmware for the 6500A that may be more up-to-date with regard to media types, but I don't know how "new" the 203D version from Dell is. You may get more insight by visiting the Dangerous Brothers website (or somebody else here more familiar with the different versions can speak to that issue).

This page (http://www.micheldeboer.nl/firmware/6500.html) shows the relationship between all the versions, the specific features of each, and the release dates.  It would seem that the 203D version is the latest, if not the greatest.  I read somewhere that Dell gets their releases early, since they are such a large buyer of NEC drives.

I may try TDB's 2.24 though.  I find the whole thing quite frustrating, since I don't want to be a power user about this stuff, I just want to make backups of actual data (and not even rip movies), and I have an ever increasing pile of unuseable (to me) blank media.  Rrrrrrr.

(in reply to MikeG)

I still think I'd try flashing with Liggy's 2.24 with the Riplock and RPC-1 fix. It wouldn't hurt to try it to see if your problem is corrected.

BTW I've heard of the upper and lower filters problem, but so far haven't had to do that with any of the 4 NEC drives I've got.

Mike

(in reply to JMuskovitz)

I tried reflashing to 2.24, but this didn't help.  Alas, I guess waiting for new firmware will be my only option.

(in reply to MikeG)

Hi! This is a pretty big thread so I couldn't read it all.
Anyway I have a Fujitsu-Siemens laptop (Amilo L1300) with NEC 6500A 2.40 firmware set as Slave at Secondary IDE.
I have no problem with booting from the drive or DMA issues but I found that the 6500 is a little bit slow at reading and writing dvd's.Reading dvd's starts 3x at the beggining and ends at about 6x.Wiritng a dvd at 8x takes about 12-13 minutes.Also the laptop takes some time to boot.The progress bar of the windows XP boot screen passes 8-9 times while at a regular pc would pass 2-3 times.Could this be relatedto the configuration of the DVD-RW?
What can I do to improve reading speed of regular data dvd's?Is today the 2.24 the latest firmware?Is there a problem with flashing original 2.24 over the 2.40 with Secondary Slave config?

(in reply to JMuskovitz)

There may be more than one issue here.

Did the 6500A come installed from the factory in your laptop? Or is the 6500A a replacement drive that you installed?

When you boot the computer and go into the bios, does the bios setup screen show the 6500A as a device set to Secondary Slave? And along those lines another question...can you boot the computer from a bootable CD/DVD or does it just fail to find the drive and boot straight into Windows instead?

You indicate that you have no problems with DMA.  When you check the Device Manager settings, does it show the drive is using DMA/UDMA or just PIO mode.  I suspect it's using PIO mode.

Mike

(in reply to gto234)

I've change the DVD 6450 into a 6500, but the main problem stay's... i've a DVD recorder, and i've burn their a TV show, then, i wanted to watch it in the computer, but it did not recognize the DVD... any one know's how do fix de problem ??

it's some problem with the firmware ?
I've now the NEC ND-6500A version: 2.23


tanks.

(in reply to MikeG)

quote:

ORIGINAL: MikeG

There may be more than one issue here.

Did the 6500A come installed from the factory in your laptop? Or is the 6500A a replacement drive that you installed?

When you boot the computer and go into the bios, does the bios setup screen show the 6500A as a device set to Secondary Slave? And along those lines another question...can you boot the computer from a bootable CD/DVD or does it just fail to find the drive and boot straight into Windows instead?

You indicate that you have no problems with DMA.  When you check the Device Manager settings, does it show the drive is using DMA/UDMA or just PIO mode.  I suspect it's using PIO mode.

Mike

1.The 6500A came installed from the factory
2.I can boot normally from a bootable CD/DVD
3.The Device Manager shows at the Seconadry IDE that the Device 1(I suppose this is slave and the Device 0 is the Master) is using Ultra DMA Mode 2.
I generally dont have any problems except the long boot and the "slow" reading-writing(Ok it's not so slow but it's not excactly as fast as the reviews tell!)

(in reply to MikeG)

Hi!

I have some problem here. I have a Dell D600 with a NEC ND-6100A. As i read it, I tried to flash it to 6500A. Fist, I tried the TDB firmware. The flashing was OK, but after that I still was not able to wirte DVD-R discs. It said: illegal disc. Then I tired Liggy's 2.24 firmware. The flashing was OK again. However, when I tried to burn a DVD-R media, the burning can not complete even the lead-in phase. After the (I think it was a big fault) I tiried this slave thing and flashed the Liggy's 4.24 firmware. The falshing was OK, however after that I was not able to boot up my laptop!! The DVD seems to be the problem. Without the DVD drive everything is OK. So my questions are:

1. How can I repair my drive? Is there any way to flash it back to a master firmware?
2. Which firmware to use?

Thanks!
AM

(in reply to emperor)

Guys here I will need your expertise because I am a bit confused.
I have a fujitsu siemens laptop with a 6500 nec dvd recorder.
BIOS shows that the nec is connected to the secondary controller
as master and I am able to boot.
Also windows XP shows the same info.
I update firmware and now i have the 4.23 but because i did not that time
the difference between 2.xx and 4.xx series (ATA, Reverse ATA)
i was supposed to have the 2.xx series.
I tried to revert the firmware but without any success. All windows utilities
can not revert the firmware. Also i tried from dos but again the same.
The problem i have is it takes long time for bios to recognize the drive
(Actually boot up screen stays about 20 seconds more than the normal time)
and the drive is much slower when i try to record any dvd.
I tried to open the drive and to do the trick with the pins 45-47 but
I found it impossible to open the drive because i have to break some clips
of the motherboard.
Can someone suggest me how can i revert to the 2.xx series firmware ?
Thanks

  

(in reply to rush911)

Hi I had the same problem, and finally I could revert back to 2.x. I have used the necflash_dos32 program (I think it is from TDB).

I have a Dell D600 & a NEC ND-6100A.
I booted DOS without the DVD writer and once it was up, I put in the DVD drive. (It caused me some freezing qeffect for a short time). Then I add the ASPI device and start the DOS32 extender. I think the magic was, that I used the -s parameter also. So my command line was the following: necflash -flas -v -s 6500RPC1.bin 0.1.0 (The device parameter came from a previous scan)

So that is all, and now I got back my 2.x firmware.

Actually I still can not write DVD-R discs.. I try simulation. Would it be the problem, that ND-6100A does not support simulation??

I hope it will help,
ActionMan

(in reply to prince)

ActionMan

I tried to flash the dvd from linux but necflash can not recognize it but it works fine under linux.
I tried to flash it from DOS but TBD utility can even initiate and necflash utility from liggy
can detect any drive. The only thing i understood from liggy's flash utility is
that firmware version 4.24xxxxxx looks unknown to the necflash utility
The only thing i can do is that i am able to flash from windows using
TDB windows utility. The process is very slow for uploading,erase, burn
at the end it says that everything is fine but when i reboot
i discover that i still have the 4.24 version instead of 2.24
I dont know what else to do
prince

(in reply to ActionMan)

I also tried to flash the dvd from windows using the necflash 1.18 and firmware 2.24
and it reported to me that i am mixing master/slave firmwares.
I proceed but after a while the necflash reported a problem that it can not upload the firmware
My dvd is at the secondary controller as master so i should have the 2.xx series firmware
Can someone alter the 4.24 firmware which i have in order to let me upload the 2.xx series ?
Thanks
prince

(in reply to prince)

Hi,
I've got a nec 6500a dvd+-rw packed in my new Dell Inspiron 6000 laptop.
The original firmware is 202c (I think..I forgot) and I changed it to official firmware from Dell site 203D.
Is there any better firmware that I can use than the official one that Dell gave?
I use Nero Info Tool to analyse my devices, and it reported that my Nec can write and read up to 24x.
Is that right? I haven't tried to burn a DVD disc yet though...

btw, I had a problem with erasing a cd-rw using nero 6. It said something about power something...
can you help solving my problem?

thanks

(in reply to prince)

Can anyone help i have a major problem i have a packard bell easynote e2315 it has a factory loaded nec nd6500a with a a firmware of 4.60 and my son got some dual layer discs to burn but they were not compatible they were infiniti so he without thinking changed the firmware to 2.24 now the drive dont work properly and it is not recognised when booting so i cant boot the recovery cd is it something to do with slave and master i keep hearing anyway i cant change firmware now to anything so is there a way to go back to old firmware also if the drive is broken and i have to get a new one do i have to get one with specific firmware so the drive will be recognised in the bios any help would be great thanks.

(in reply to veenone)

becool,
I'm not familuar with your notebook pc, but the answer to your questions is.... Yes, you need to flash the 6500 with the "Reverse ATA" firmware {any 4.xx firmware.}    Here is a Link for the Reverse ATA package http://liggydee.cdfreaks.com/page/6500/

Follow the instructions EXACTLY. It may be difficult if you don't have an adapter and a regular desk top PC to flash it in. Once you complete that, check here... http://www.micheldeboer.nl/firmware/6500.html for the very limited supply of 'Reverse ATA' firmwares available. Try liggys 4.24.  It is newer that the 4.60 you were using before. It will also allow you to 'bitset' your +R disks to make them more compatible.

Good luck.

(in reply to becool)