CD/DVD Drive Doors Don't Open Reliably

[tjg79]

I've got two different CD/DVD Drives in my desktop that often do not open when the button is pushed. The seem to be jammed. I get the led light and I can hear that it's attempting to open, and it moves a small fraction of an inch, but it appears to be stuck. They will eventually open after repeated tries. The condition appears to be intermittent. On rare occaisions, they will open on the first depression of the button. Sometimes one will open and the other will be difficult. Originally, I thought this was an operating system issue, but I'm installing a new OS with bare drives and the doors were misbehaving.

Has anyone experienced this annoyance and found a solution? Do these doors need to be cleaned and lubricated?

Regards

 

[Mellon Head]

I had a similar problem with an older build. The solution was to replace the drive.

CD/DVD drives are cheap, and as a result, they are not built to last very long.

 

[Berton]

I just weeded out half a dozen such drives because they wouldn't open the tray. I think the amount of power to them is an issue, seem to work better if having their own power lead from the power supply, not share the power lead with another drive. That was the way I tested to rule out the truly bad drives.