OS/2 and Panasonic CDROM: Help!

[cph@martigny.ai.mit.edu (Chris Hanson)]

   From: Paulo Magalhaes <pamaga@biobase.dk>
   Date: Mon, 1 Apr 1996 06:44:42 +0200 (MET DST)

   Ok, after too long a delay I finally found the time to install OS/2 Warp
   Connect on my little TP750Cs. I set the weekend aside, told friends and 
   relatives that I was going away for the weekend, backed up all the data,
   read the manual, and sat down full of optimism... Never made it past the
   first diskette! My trustworthy Panasonic KXL-D720 CD-ROM (at least it is
   so under DOS/Windows) remained invisible... I tried all the tricks in my
   book: from re-reading the manual to minor modifications in the config.sys;
   from cursing to sweet-talking the machine into just taking a brief, brief
   look at the nice little CD-ROM player sitting next to it. Nothing would
   remove the cloak of invisibility from the poor Panasonic... Help! How do
   I install an OS that comes in a CD-ROM when the #&@$(&? thing wont even
   see the CD-ROM player? (Yes, it is plugged in, and ON!!!) Thank you, and
   forgive the warped (oh, that word again!!!) sense of humour: it is the
   frustration of many hours sitting in front of this machine...

You're out of luck.

We purchased one of these units last summer, when USA Flex mistakenly
advertised it as having OS/2 drivers.  After a short run-around, we
got a not-very-convincing statement from Panasonic that they would
have OS/2 drivers in "August or September", so we returned the drive
to USA Flex and bought something else.

The drivers were never released (probably not even written), and to
the best of my knowledge there is no way to use that drive with OS/2.
This is not an unusual story for this otherwise fairly nice operating
system.

What's ironic about the story is that the drive was purchased for my
boss, who is the Matsushita Professor of Electrical Engineering here
at MIT.