Only One CD-R or CD-RW Disk Drive Can Be Used to Create Compact Discs in Windows XP

When you have a computer with more than one CD-R or CD-RW disk drive, only one disk drive may enable you to create compact discs. If you click to select the Enable CD Recording on this drive check box for either the CD-R or CD-RW disk drive that is not enabled, the computer seems to apply the change, but the disk drive remains disabled. When you examine the CD-R or CD-RW disk drive properties, the Enable option is not selected.

This problem can occur because the creation of compact discs in Windows XP is limited to the first CD-R or CD-RW disk drive that had been specified at startup.

To resolve this problem, change the physical location of the preferred CD-R or CD-RW disk drive on the device chain.

Microsoft has confirmed that this is a problem in the Microsoft products that are listed at the beginning of this article.

The initiated disk drive is the first disk drive that is detected as a CD-ROM recording device during the device enumeration process. The order of the enumeration process is:

Onboard integrated device electronics (IDE): primary master
Onboard IDE: primary slave
Onboard IDE: secondary master
Onboard IDE: secondary slave
Small computer system interface (SCSI) devices (including add-on IDE controllers)

For additional information about the enumeration of SCSI controllers, click the article number below to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base: