I'm running on and XP machine with 2 IDE HDD on the primary channel and a LiteOn CDRW on the Secondary channel setup as the master and a Ricoh DVDRW setup as the slave on the secondary channel.

When I come to write to the LiteOn drive I have no problems burning. However if I want to burn DVD data to the Ricoh I have to disable the LiteOn in the BIOS to ensure the DVD burns correctly.

Unfortunately I need to have both drives so removing the LiteOn is not really a viable option and the Ricoh won't work with large format CD's.

Does anyone have any ideas on how I can have these two drives working happily together without the hassel of disabling the LiteOn in the BIOS whenever I need to burn DVD data.

strange! ...

What software are you using to burn CD & DVD's? I like Nero & it lets me select the device I want to use.

It sounds like you could have a Master/Slave problem. Are they on the same cable?? How are they jumpered??

I've tried various software: RecordNow Max 4.5, Nero 6.3.0.2 and Copy to DVD.

Both the drives are on the same cable. The LiteOn CDRW is set to the master and the Ricoh DVDRW is set to the slave.

Have you tried switching them? Ie - LiteOn as slave, Ricoh DVD as master? I'm just thinking that the Ricoh might be picky enough to require a master setting (I've seen it before).

Another option would be to get them off the same IDE cable. Make your two HDDs masters on each IDE cable, and make your two optical drives slaves to them.

You might need to experiment with the jumper settings. I would try both on Cable Select and see if that works. If all else fails, you could put them on separate IDE ports...

Edit: yeah, what saph said.....:)