I was watching a DVD on my 12" pBook and it sounded like the drive was gonna croak...that was first time it made horrendous noises. All of my notebook drives are loud...but the 12" pBook is very loud and sounds like it is thrashing about...only with DVDs though.
yes this is normal. on the original ti books they used to be quieter, but from moving to the combos and superdrives they have gotten a scarier sound when it goes. i must say i thought something was wrong when it made that noise. its all normal.
Sometimes i get scared when my 1Ghz tiBook pulls in a CD or DVD with alarge crunch bang thingy, first i get a shock, then i fear for the life of the drive, and lastly i fear for the CD..... it hurts me everytime.