Wayne,

Thank you for visiting the Dell Community Forum.

A couple of things you might try are: If you have not already done so, in the BIOS setup under Boot Sequence see if you can select the order of optical boot devices. If this is not available, try setting the CDRW drive to Off in the Drive Configuration menu of the BIOS setup. If none of this helps, you may need disconnect the CDRW drive and try booting from the DVD drive then.

Stephen, I turned off the CD drive in bios and now I'm able to boot via my DVD burner.  Thank you for the suggestion.  I didn't even THINK about trying that.

Appreciate the quick answer.

Wayne,

Thanks for the update; I am glad I could be of some help.

I am having the same problem with my new Dimension 8400. I need to boot from the DVD drive (Dell only sent a DVD, not CD, of the restoration system), but the BIOS lists only the CD drive. The CD drive will boot fine, but the DVD will not boot.

In the previous posting, the person was able to change from CD to DVD boot by making changes in the BIOS. But my BIOS DOES NOT LIST THE DVD DRIVE AT ALL, much less as an option for booting. The DVD drive works fine, and can be found through Windows XP Media Center, but the DVD is not listed as a boot option in the BIOS.

Separate from my issue, this may become a significant issue for Dell for users who are not as familiar with computers. They are making the CD drive the only boot drive, but then are sending the restoration software on DVD. Not a good idea. The last thing Dell needs is amatuer users messing around in the BIOS to change the boot drive.

Thank you for your help.
Matthew

Has anyone found a solution to this?

Will flashing bios do any good?

I also got the same thing on my Dimension 8400, I want to boot from the dvd drive but it doesn't show up in boot sequence. Tried the above but didn't work.

I really think I should be able to boot from this drive.

Hope someone can help me here..

h8yall:

The DVD may not show up as a DVD in the BIOS. It may just say CD drive. If you disconnect the other drive and connect the DVD drive as mast and only device, it will boot for sure.

thanx for the reply, I did disconnect the other drive but forgot to check the master/slave thingy. when I get home from work I'm going to check that. will post if I get it working or not.

thanx again!! I got it working now, was indeed the master/slave thing, set it to master and now it boots like it should.

thanx!