PIONEER DVD-RW DVRTD08 is disabled if there is no disc present at boot time

[<linux-ide@momail.e4ward.com>]

Hello,
several Sony Vaio laptops seem to have the PIONEER DVD-RW DVRTD08 DVD/CD
drive built in. This drive is available only when a disc is inserted
during boot.
when no disc is present, dmesg has

[    3.715535] ata2: SATA max UDMA/133 abar m2048@0xd3e04000 port
0xd3e04180 irq 218
[    4.368166] ata2: SATA link up 1.5 Gbps (SStatus 113 SControl 300)
[    4.380063] ata2.00: ATAPI: PIONEER DVD-RW  DVRTD08, 1.00, max UDMA/33
[    9.380102] ata2.00: qc timeout (cmd 0xef)
[    9.380112] ata2.00: failed to set xfermode (err_mask=0x4)
[    9.700093] ata2: SATA link up 1.5 Gbps (SStatus 113 SControl 300)
[   19.712097] ata2.00: qc timeout (cmd 0xef)
[   19.712105] ata2.00: failed to set xfermode (err_mask=0x4)
[   19.712158] ata2: limiting SATA link speed to 1.5 Gbps
[   19.712160] ata2.00: limiting speed to UDMA/33:PIO3
[   20.032106] ata2: SATA link up 1.5 Gbps (SStatus 113 SControl 310)
[   30.040084] ata2.00: qc timeout (cmd 0xef)
[   30.040091] ata2.00: failed to set xfermode (err_mask=0x4)
[   30.040144] ata2.00: disabled
[   30.056102] ata2: hard resetting link
[   30.376108] ata2: SATA link up 1.5 Gbps (SStatus 113 SControl 310)
[   30.376114] ata2: EH complete

when a disc is present, dmesg has
[    3.804304] ata2: SATA max UDMA/133 irq_stat 0x00000040, cirq 219
[    5.268599] ata2: SATA link up 1.5 Gbps (SStatus 113 SControl 300)
[    5.270213] ata2.00: ATAPI: PIONEER DVD-RW  DVRTD08, 1.00, max UDMA/33
[    5.272217] ata2.00: configured for UDMA/33

You'll find more details at http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?p=6412465#post6412465

Having read http://www.mail-archive.com/linux-ide@vger.kernel.org/msg06127.html I guess it is not OK for the device to timeout in response to 0xef.
Still I would like to be able to use the drive without having to insert a CD at every boot. Is there any workaround? Can't the driver just treat
repeated timeouts like it would treat an abort?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Regards,
Moritz Rigler