Dead DVD Drive? Can't access/boot from it, spits CD out

[Mazarin]

Hello all;

I just got my first Mac, a G4 800 QS 2002. Never had a Mac before and got it for nothing, so I figured I'd play around w/ it. I've done a fair bit of reading on it, just enough to be dangerous. Everything works fine except the DVD drive. It won't read. Can't boot off of it. If it has a CD in it, it spits the tray out. So it looks like it can read but doesn't get past the cover, if you get what I mean. I've tried resetting the PRAM to no effect. Made sure all connections are good.

Is there anything else I can do, or is the drive pretty much dead?

 

[Nameci]

What OS are you running now? Can you open up system profiler and see if it still the original optical drive. It should read as "apple shipping drive".

 

[MacmancUK]

Hello all;

I just got my first Mac, a G4 800 QS 2002. Never had a Mac before and got it for nothing, so I figured I'd play around w/ it. I've done a fair bit of reading on it, just enough to be dangerous. Everything works fine except the DVD drive. It won't read. Can't boot off of it. If it has a CD in it, it spits the tray out. So it looks like it can read but doesn't get past the cover, if you get what I mean. I've tried resetting the PRAM to no effect. Made sure all connections are good.

Is there anything else I can do, or is the drive pretty much dead?

If it's 2002 model it maybe isn't a DVD drive, and the software may not support one anyway.

When you say CD, do you mean CD, or DVD.

It's not an MP3 CD is it ?

 

[Mazarin]

I'll have to check when I get home. Running Tiger. The Tiger disk is what I've been trying to read. The Eject function works, and when the disc goes in I can hear it buzz like it's trying to read it, then kicks it out.

I'm gonna kick myself if the issue is trying to view a DVD in a CR drive. Never crossed my mind :/

 

[MacmancUK]

I'll have to check when I get home. Running Tiger. The Tiger disk is what I've been trying to read. The Eject function works, and when the disc goes in I can hear it buzz like it's trying to read it, then kicks it out.

I'm gonna kick myself if the issue is trying to view a DVD in a CR drive. Never crossed my mind :/

If that is the case, Apple can (used to be able to) supply you with CD version (at a price?)
Not sure how you go about it, a search of the apple website will probably help, or Google !
As no doubt will someone on this forum...

You say the G4 is running Tiger, and you are trying a Tiger disc.
Did the discs come with the computer, or did you source them elsewhere ?
I think you may need the CD version.

I once tried to install software on my G3 from an external DVD drive, it didn't want to know.
The external DVD drive worked fine with the G3 otherwise, for downloading files from and to DVD-R's.

 

[666sheep]

I'm gonna kick myself if the issue is trying to view a DVD in a CR drive. Never crossed my mind :/

It seems to be it. If it's original factory drive, it's CD-RW - this model was never shipped with DVD-R or even Combo.

 

[stroked]

I have had good luck with replacing the OD in two different Powermacs, 667 and 933 mhz, with DVD drives from a PC. They both play DVDs, but they will not burn. They do burn form an external drive though.

 

[Mazarin]

Ok, I swapped out another drive from another G4 as all is well. Added some ram too so now I'm over a gig. Thanks alot!

 

[sysiphus]

Ok, I swapped out another drive from another G4 as all is well. Added some ram too so now I'm over a gig. Thanks alot!

Glad it worked out for you. Apple's cycle between DVD-RAM, DVD-ROM, CD-RW, and DVD-R was very odd in the early 2000s. Easy mistake to make.