Mac Mini Broken Combo Drive

[fivetoadsloth]

MY sisters g4 mini has recently developed a problem with cd's. When they are loaded they get sucked in and spin than stop in a few seconds. THey are never recognized vby the finder, and to eject them one needs to restart holding the mouise button. Any ideas? The drive is really important to her use. Reinstalling the system will not work as the drive won't work and the problem persists in any a different user.

Oops, The issue is with DVD's as well. Is the problem definatly hardware? She is looking to sell the machine and naturally this will greatly decrease its value.

[dandam]

I encountered the same problem about a month and a half ago. I had replaced the hard drive about two months before that and wondered if that had something to do with the problem, instead, I'm afraid the mini combo drives just don't have much of a life. Sadly, I haven't found DIY replacements on iFixit or similar sites.

[A Pittarelli]

i think the DIY fix for this is buying new mini unfortunately :(

[Eidorian]

All that you need to do is pop the top off and replace the optical drive.

You can even watch a movie (http://eshop.macsales.com/tech_center/installation.cfm) here to see how it's done.

i think the DIY fix for this is buying new mini unfortunately :(I can see you've never opened a Mac mini before.

[aquajet]

i think the DIY fix for this is buying new mini unfortunately :(


That's completely unnecessary.

Otherworldcomputing sells a $99 dual-layer Superdrive upgrade kit for the Mini. I'm sure if you looked around, you could find something even cheaper.