Any computer techs out there? - Apple help needed

[Wall-E1]

I'm having an issue with my imac. It's an intel core 2 with a superdrive(optical drive). Last night it began giving me trouble ejecting a c.d. that I had in it. It eventually came out. I placed a different c.d. in it to see if the issue was with the c.d., or the drive. Now that one is stuck in the drive. I have checked around the web and tried several solutions - shutting and restarting while holding down the eject button, or the mouse button, going into system utilities to force it to eject, sticking a business card in the drive to try to trip a switch(I was desperate). Anyway, it's not coming out. When I hit eject, it makes the noise as if it is coming out, but it doesn't. It just reloads and reads the same c.d.

I know if I take it to an Apple store, I'll be looking at several hundreds of dollars($400 or more). The computer is not under warranty anymore. I saw on a message board where someone said you can attach an external optical drive to the computer and just use that one. Would that be a solution? I see optical drives sell for around $100 on Amazon. If so, does anyone have a recommendation of a good optical drive that is compatible with the imac? Will it work even though there is now a disc forever stuck in the built in drive?

Thanks for any help.

 

[LuvOrlando]

This has happened to me a few times and it always freaks me out. Sometimes I get the message that it doesn't recognize the DVD, but it will see it if I open up "DVD player" Anyway, you can try turning it off then on again and see if it will recognize the disk. I don't know why this happens, I always thought it was just me.

 

[maelstrom]

I'm not sure if this is true on the new iMacs, but on my old iBook, you could stick a slightly bent paperclip into the slot and push the button inside that would eject the CD. In my experience, the optical drives in Apple computers are quite finicky. The one in my iBook was always having troubles, and the one in my parents iMac had to be replaced when the computer was less than a year old.

And yes, you can hookup an external optical drive and use that for now until you have the money to fix the internal drive (if it's even worth fixing, don't know how old your iMac is).

 

[Wall-E1]

This has happened to me a few times and it always freaks me out. Sometimes I get the message that it doesn't recognize the DVD, but it will see it if I open up "DVD player" Anyway, you can try turning it off then on again and see if it will recognize the disk. I don't know why this happens, I always thought it was just me.

I'm not getting any messages at all. I hit eject, it makes the normal eject noises, then the c.d. starts up again as if I had just inserted it - so frustrating! I've tried turning it off and on several times. It's just not being very cooperative.

I'm not sure if this is true on the new iMacs, but on my old iBook, you could stick a slightly bent paperclip into the slot and push the button inside that would eject the CD. In my experience, the optical drives in Apple computers are quite finicky. The one in my iBook was always having troubles, and the one in my parents iMac had to be replaced when the computer was less than a year old.

And yes, you can hookup an external optical drive and use that for now until you have the money to fix the internal drive (if it's even worth fixing, don't know how old your iMac is).

I tried the bent paperclip trick - no luck.

My computer is probably 5 years old. I 'll probably go the cheaper route and get the external drive(just not sure what model or brand is best). My son only has a laptop, so I could pass this one off to him in the near future and get myself a shiny new one.

 

[LuvOrlando]

Did you try ejecting it from within the program that is running the DVD instead of using the button?

 

[Wall-E1]

Yeah, did that. I even tried dragging the desktop icon to the garbage pail(which changes into the eject symbol). It seems like it is trying to eject, but something is not letting it go.

I called a local computer repair shop and was told that nobody repairs the drives, they just replace them.

 

[princessmom29]

Wait, I thought Apples NEVER have issues, and are always in perfect working order??? So, they aren't perfect after all!

 

[136368]

All I can recommend is taking the computer to your local Genius Bar. It probably WILL cost a bit, but those guys know what they're doing and will fix it up a treat. You don't want to mess around with or neglect this on any computer...

 

[Shutterbug]

you can take it to the Genius Bar and see if they can get the disc out for you.

As far as your options after that, you can buy an external DVD drive, I would try to find one that you can run through your firewire port.