The fabric piece inside my cd player came apart...

Same thing happened to me (I even started a thread about it here). If you're still under warranty/have AppleCare, Apple will most likely fix it. At least that's what they told me. I didn't have AppleCare and my warranty was expired, and they quoted me a repair price of around $300. The guy at the genius bar actually told me how to fix it myself, which I did. It is not an easy repair at all. Unless you're very confident with your ability to disassemble and reassemble electronics, I don't think I'd recommend it. However, if you feel you're up to it, go to ifixit.com and download their guide for replacing the optical drive (you don't have to actually replace the optical drive, you just have to take it out).

Whatever you do, DON'T try to disassemble your PB without an iFixit (or similar) step by step guide. You'll never get it back together right if you try to do it on your own. Use iFixit's screw guides to keep track of the many tiny screws that you'll have to remove and then put back in exactly the right place.

Nectar said:

I mean it looks like it could just be fixed by easing it back into the crevasses, I'd much rather cut it off than take all those steps and risk killing my mac. 🙁

Is that piece really crucial?

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Well, the thing is, it looks like it just sticks down into some clips inside, but in reality it's glued to the side panel of the case. If it's like mine, it's stretched out now and won't really go back in the right way. It's not essential, you'll just have to be extra careful when inserting CDs not to scratch them. As for ejecting them, I'm not sure what to tell you. Maybe try with a CD-R and see if it scratches it when you eject.

What size PB do you have? Mine's a 12" and things may be different for the 15" and 17" models. For all I know, it might be a lot easier to get to the optical drive in your PB and taking it apart won't be such a big deal. Getting the optical drive out of a 12" PB requires removing everything except the internal bluetooth module, speakers and screen. You have to remove the logic board, cooling assembly/heatsink, hard drive and a bunch of other stuff that I don't even remember to get to it. It took me almost a whole day to open it and get it put back together correctly.

Anyway, check out the iFixit guide for your particular model of PB to get a feel for how hard it would be to get to the optical drive.

Nectar said:

Mine is a 12" PB as well. Thank you for your reply. 🙂 I'm glad you found the solution to fix yours. Truth is, I don't feel comfortable taking the entire thing apart and don't feel at ease sending it away either. Is that little piece there just to protect the cd/dvd? If that's the case, I'd much rather have a scratched up disc than an unworkable PB.

Did you have to glue yours back on?

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It's mostly there to protect the disk. I guess a secondary reason for it is to keep dust out of the drive, but I don't imagine that's too big of a deal. Mine was stretched out badly enough that it was not really possible to glue it back in. I ended up cutting a strip of fabric from an old shirt and gluing that in instead. It doesn't look very nice, but it gets the job done.