Wayne Chirnside wrote in a message to All:

 WC> The old cable for the Creative CD-ROM drive is wired blank, white, 
 WC> black, red with red to the side of the drive while the new 
 WC> CD-ROM's cable goes into the drive as white, blank, black, red 
 WC> Same order but the blank is in a different place on each plug and
 WC> the pins do not match.

The physical compatibility of the plugs is the real issue here.  Black and
blank are not a problem,  two of those pins are ground,  it doesn't much
matter which ones you use.  I've encountered two types of plugs on sound
cards that were pretty similar (small,  white plastic) but which were wired
opposite to each other -- one would work and the other would give you
silence.  If you're dealing with slightly newer hardware the connector on
the sound card will match the one on the drive and it won't matter at all.

The card I have in the former w3.11 box here was an "ESS1868" and
had three connectors,  the larger one that matched the drive and the two
that were wired differently.  The one I have in the linux box is an
"ESS1869",  which has one small white plastic connector and one
larger one -- I've tried both and they're equally noisy.  The one PCI card
I have here,  an SB16PCI (model CT4740) has only the larger style black
plastic connectors on it,  but there are three of them with inside access.

 WC> Any opionions as to what success or disaster I might face were I 
 WC> to cut off the connector from the PCI sound card and wire it to 
 WC> the end of the cable coming from the sound card soldering the 
 WC> salvaged connector and correcting the wiring order?

Don't worry about the wiring order if the only thing different is black and
blank,  they're both grounds,  and it doesn't matter.  If the connectors
fit,  try it -- it'll work or it won't.  If it won't,  we can probably hook
you up with the right cable,  I have a bunch of them around here that I'll
never use.

 WC> Sound card works everywhere but with the CD due to the lack of 
 WC> that connection.

That'll do it!  :-)

 WC> I want to get audio off the new 40X drive but not let the smoke out
 WC> of anything.

Not likely to be a problem.

 WC> The PCI soundcard is Turtle Beach which I've heard of but lack 
 WC> software for so I'm looking for a workaround for the Sound card I 
 WC> do have working software for loaded, opinions?

I've heard of them.  If you decide you don't wanna mess with it,  let me
know - I'll give it a shot here.  :-)

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