HL-DT-ST DVDRRW GSA-H21N driver

I am having problems with my HL-DT-ST DVDRRW GSA-H21N drive. It reads CDs well enough, but gets the heebie jeebies with DVDs. (It seemed to get a terminal illness after I installed Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, as it happens, but I imagine that is beside the point.) It will only intermittently play DVD-ROMs, and DVD movies skip constantly. I'm hoping this is a driver problem rather than an electronic failure.

I would like to download the latest driver, but the closest I can find to the GSA-H21N on LG's website is the GSA-H20N. Is this close enough?

(A big thank you, incidentally, to karangguni for his magnificent FAQ. I understand the jumble of letters and numbers much better now. Also, I see from other threads that there has been confusion in the past between the H21N and another drive called the H12N. I do mean H21N.)

I've never heard of the H21N until now. But there is no driver needed for the drive but may cause conflicts when using the chipset IDE driver (NVIDIA, VIA, SiS, etc.) If you have one of those, you may want to uninstall it. Of course, check to make sure the drive is in UDMA-2 mode at least, through Device Manager.

You should be able to use CD-DVD Speed 4.7.0 (here) and run some tests.

First of all, what you are referring to are firmware updates, not drivers. Firmware updates actually modify the code on a chip in the drive. This code determines how a drive behaves in many ways. Drivers are bits of software which tell the operating system exactly how to talk to the drive to get it to do specific things.

Unlike drivers, you have to use exactly the same model of firmware updates as the drive model you have. You cannot use something close to, but not exactly the same model as your drive's model. The difference between two model numbers can be that the hardware inside is entirely different. Flashing with the wrong firmware can kill your drive, and invalidate warranty cover as well. So no, don't use the H20N's firmware.

From what I know, the GSA-H21N is an OEM only model, meaning it is a custom model for OEM computer manufacturers (e.g. HP, Dell) who bundle the drives with their computers. Due to this fact, LG does not provide firmware updates on their webpages for OEM models - it is instead left to the OEM to provide the firmware updates. You'll have to look for whichever computer manufacturer made the computer which your drive came preloaded in to find firmware updates.

Why is a GSA model an OEM model in this case? I don't know. LG is doing funny things again with their current model number system.

Thanks, karangguni.

My computer is Compaq, so it looks like this page:
http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/s...roduct=2512097
... is the one I need for the H21N.

And thanks to KTL for the CD/DVD-speed suggestion.

@le_poulet_noir: I doubt that a suddenly apearing and remaining problem is caused by the drives firmware. The games you installed might have installed some copy protection stuff, so if you can, try the drive in a different PC or boot from a fresh and clean XP installation.

Visiting the HP web site or reading the MCSE changelog helps to be uptodate . HP released the D700 firmware about 3 month ago. They even have a GSA-H31N firmware now.

I know this post has been dead for awhile but thought I'd throw this on here just in case it would help someone out. I was having the same issues with my drive after moving it from a Dell to a system I recently built. It would read and write CD's fine but was having a hard time even reading DVD's. I decided make sure I had the most up-to-date firmware but Dell doesn't seem to have the file on their server anymore. I updated my firmware with a download from http://drivers.softpedia.com/progDow...oad-28966.html and I'm having no more issues with DVD's. Later.

Hi and Welcome!Dell is not HP
http://search.dell.com/results.aspx?...21N%20Firmware

Michael

I am having this very same issue. My drive is hl-dt-st dvd+-rw gsa-h21n, computer is DELL Dimension E310 OS:Windows XP SP3

Do you think I should try updating to the firmware you refer to? I don't know if my drive is an LG drive, that's why I'm asking. Please note that I have very limited(no) experience in updating firmware (or fixing computers for that matter).

Thanks for any help

I opened up the computer and unplugged the drive and plugged it in again in case it was not properly connected to the motherboard. Also blew some pressure air into the drive to remove any dust that might be on the lens.

I have also re-installed the drive.

The only thing I can think of is up-dating the firmware, but I am not sure what to update it with.

Any ideas?

You can try, but probably updating the firmware (if there is a newer one) cannot help in ths case.
Scan your computer for rootkits and spyware.