Re: CDrom drive

[turnbull@example.com (Stephen J. Turnbull)]

    sam> Hello eveyone..  Please help... I would like to buy a CDRom
    sam> drive for my computer, but I want to make sure the CDRom
    sam> drive is supported by Linux.  Here is the following CDROM
    sam> drives that I would like to cosider:

    sam> Toshiba 5301B Quad speed (SCSI) Panasonic Quad speed (SCSI)
    sam> Sony CDU-76S Quad speed (SCSI) Sanyo Quad speed (SCSI)

If it is SCSI, it is supported.  Unfortunately, it may not be SCSI,
even though it claims to be (ie, the *drive* doesn't properly support
the SCSI standard).  There are also some differences about what the
standard actually says, so I hear.  For the first problem, get the
most recent kernel sources, and look in /usr/src/linux/drivers/scsi or 
thereabouts.  grep for "BLACKLIST", and that will be the list of
devices that are known not to comply.  In many cases, noncompliance
means that autoprobing fails or even locks up the machine, but once
the device is identified there are no problems.  In others, it means
you will lose capabilities, or even it just don't work.

For the second problem (about disagreements among wizards), I'm out of 
my depth.  Ask one of the hardware types.

"Use the Source, Luke." - apocryphal, attributed to Richard "Obi-wan"
Stallman, as I recall.

I would guess that any and all of the above CD-ROM drives would work
fine, however.  (Up to the deficiencies of SCSI, about which ask
Mr. "ATAPI" Tittsler.)

-- 
                            Stephen J. Turnbull
Institute of Socio-Economic Planning                         Yaseppochi-Gumi
University of Tsukuba                      http://turnbull.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp/
Tennodai 1-1-1, Tsukuba, 305 JAPAN                 turnbull@example.com