We did it! After a couple of days of messing around with drivers, I’ve finally managed to get my Creative Labs CD-200 double-speed CD-ROM drive working under DOS. Something that ought to have been relatively straightforward turned into a surprisingly stubborn little project, mostly because finding useful information about this particular drive was a nightmare.

The breakthrough came while I was downloading and trying assorted Creative drivers. I happened to notice a reference to the CD-200 in one of the packages and thought that was a rather promising coincidence. Sure enough, CCD.SYS turned out to be the driver that worked in my setup. Once that loads, MSCDEX gives DOS a drive letter and we can finally start accessing discs.

There was another trick hiding on the back of the drive. I’d fitted a jumper on one of the identifier positions, and MSCDEX kept freezing during startup. Removing that jumper got me past the problem, although I wouldn’t assume the same configuration is right for every controller and drive combination. These are the settings that worked with my particular Sound Blaster and CD-200.

CONFIG.SYS
DEVICE=C:\SBPRO\DRV\CTSBPRO.SYS /UNIT=0 /BLASTER=A:220 I:5 D:1
DEVICE=C:\SBPRO\DRV\CTMMSYS.SYS
DEVICE=C:\CCD.SYS /D:MSCD001 /P:220 /S:D

AUTOEXEC.BAT
SET SOUND=C:\SBPRO
SET BLASTER=A220 I5 D1 T4
SET MIDI=SYNTH:1 MAP:E
C:\SBPRO\SBPSET /P /Q
C:\SB16\DRV\MSCDEX.EXE /D:MSCD001 /V /M:15

With that configuration loaded, DOS recognised the CD-ROM and I could finally get at the disc. I was almost expecting another problem to appear when I tried it for the first time, but no, it actually worked! After staring at a desktop full of random drivers and wondering what I’d missed, that’s a pretty satisfying result.

Thanks to everyone who helped me track this one down. A functioning double-speed Creative CD-ROM drive is now sitting in the Osborne, and I think that earns us a BBQ party!

Resources

Sources