Can't enable DMA on DVD ROM (Solved)

[jdunn]

DMA works fine for my harddrive but I can't enable DMA on my DVD ROM. DVD play-back on Kaffeine is a little sluggish. I've tried everything here:

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/DMA

and had no luck. I also checked BIOS settings. I even tried different versions of firmware for my DVD ROM. Here's some info on my system. ABIT IS7 ( uses Intel IH6 chipset), Pioneer DVD-115 (tried firmware 1.22 and 1.33), Kubuntu 6.06 (up-to-date) with 686 kernel.

What can I try next? What might be the problem? :P

------

Update:
The problem was a bad Pioneer DVDROM Drive. I replaced it and DMA now works with smooth DVD playback.

[Volvo_Guy]

Re: Can't enable DMA on DVD ROM

What happens when you run hdparm? This is my readout:
will@uber-geex:~$ sudo hdparm /dev/cdrom

/dev/cdrom:
IO_support = 1 (32-bit)
unmaskirq = 1 (on)
using_dma = 1 (on)
keepsettings = 0 (off)
readonly = 0 (off)
readahead = 256 (on)
HDIO_GETGEO failed: Invalid argument

Also, try making your DVD-ROM master on the secondary channel, assuming you only have 1 hard drive, and 1 optical drive.


Will

[jdunn]

Re: Can't enable DMA on DVD ROM


/dev/hdc:
IO_support = 0 (default 16-bit)
unmaskirq = 0 (off)
using_dma = 0 (off)
keepsettings = 0 (off)
readonly = 0 (off)
readahead = 256 (on)
HDIO_GETGEO failed: Invalid argument

sudo hdparm -d1 -k1 /dev/hdc
Password:

/dev/hdc:
setting using_dma to 1 (on)
setting keep_settings to 1 (on)
using_dma = 1 (on)
keepsettings = 1 (on)


However, when I reboot or start playing a DVD with Kaffeine, hdparm reveals that DMA is turned off. If I make changes in /etc/hdparm.conf and reboot, hdparm reveals that DMA is off.

At one time, I think DMA might have worked...before I had this problem...but that was some time ago before I started changing DVDROM firmware and prior to a complete reinstall of Kubunutu (same version). I first noticed the DMA issue when DVD play was jerky.

Could this be a driver issue? I'm not sure how to check drivers or change them in Linux.

[jdunn]

Re: Can't enable DMA on DVD ROM

Okay, I'm beginning to suspect the problem is with the Pioneer DVD ROM itself. Unfortunately, I can't remember exactly what the original firmware version was but, every firmware update since has left me without DMA.

I ran the Kubuntu LIVE CD and still had the same problem with DMA on my Pioneer DVD-115. Then, I ran the Kubuntu LIVE CD on another machine with identical motherboard, identical BIOS setup, a Plextor DVD writer, and no-name DVD ROM. hdparm revealed that DMA was working for both the Plextor writer and no-name DVDROM.

I guess I need a new DVD ROM.