Help DVD Drive Won't Close

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dixonbm

Registered
Help DVD Drive Won't Close on my iBook 500. It fell off the table and now the drive won't stay shut. If I hold it closed the cd comes up fine. But when I let go the drive pops out. The mechanism that holds the drive shut isn't working. Any idea if this is something I can fix myself? I'm willing to take it apart. I just don't know where to look. If I have to take it in, does that mean I'll have to replace the drive? It's only the closing mechanism.

Thank You for any suggestions, help.

I appreciate it.
 
I don't think you are really willing to take it apart. It's not just a matter of few screws. I would rather visit the next store and tell them to check it. Don't think they will change the whole drive, but who knows?
 
But if I recall right, the closing mechanism is not located around the lid of your drive but deeper inside.
 
Well, the motors that open and close it might be located deeper in the drive, but the latches might be close to the exterior, and who knows what happened when he dropped it.

Don't open it up yourself. Take it to an authorized Apple retailer or repair shop and have them do it, or send it in to Apple for repair. If you have Applecare or it's covered by warranty, they'll hopefully replace it free of charge.
 
arden said:
Well, the motors that open and close it might be located deeper in the drive, but the latches might be close to the exterior, and who knows what happened when he dropped it.

Don't open it up yourself. Take it to an authorized Apple retailer or repair shop and have them do it, or send it in to Apple for repair. If you have Applecare or it's covered by warranty, they'll hopefully replace it free of charge.
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If apple notebooks are built anything like pc notebooks....you DO NOT want to take that apart...trust me..i used to have to service pc laptops and if you can take one apart correctly...you are good. If you can put it back together....you are godly....take it to a service center, do yourself that favor.

Oh, and backup your files ;)
 
I've taken my Pismo apart before. While MacOSX.com was down I went ahead and started taking it apart. I found a guide on the net to help, only it was for the hard drive. The ibook is much more complicated than my old pismo. After looking at the drive more I noticed that the mechanism appeared to be in good working order. I eventually became stumped as to how to get the drive out of the frame, so I got a flashlight and looked in while holding the tray out. I looked about where the latch was and found a bent piece of metal.

A little pice of the drive casing that is bent down is what they use to latch the tray shut. What a piece of crap. No wonder they moved to the slot loading drives. Anyway I figured I'd try and bend it back. I couldn't find anything that would fit in there. Finally I searched around. I needed some pliers. I asked my mom about it and she suggested a hemostat. For those of you who don't know its a medical tool for closing off veins and stuff. Anyway they look like a very skinny pair of pliers. So I reached in there and tried bending it back and was able to get it back a bit. Finally it latched shut although the bezel stuck out more than it should, so I tried moving the little piece of metal some more and wouldn't you know it, the crappy piece of metal broke. You should have seen that little piece of junk that was so important to the dvd drive. I am so pissed off about it. Unless I can get a case exterior for the drive or something I'm going to be forced to fork out money to some tech to take it apart and put in a new drive. Anyone have any ideas as for creating another piece of crap metal for it to latch onto? I was thinking about punching a hole in the case and pushing down the piece of metal, but I am not sure how to get the drive out.

Anyone want to help me? I'll only take it to a tech as a last resort. I'm pretty good at taking these things apart.

Sorry for using the word crap so much. There are few other choice words I would have preferred, but I didn't want to offend any iBook lovers. ;)
 
dixonbm said:
...and wouldn't you know it, the crappy piece of metal broke.
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HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!!!

Sorry... LOL... but what do you expect? You should have listened to us, and had a professional look at it.

Do you still have the piece of metal? If so, can you scan it or take a picture of it and put it up? Maybe someone can suggest something else as an alternate, like perhaps a bottle opener.
 
Well Arden you can laugh. But I didn't read your posts before going in. I couldn't even get into the site until this evening. I tried take a shot of the broken piece but couldn't get a good shot. Here's the best I could come up with compared to a dime.

Thanks for the sympathy!

Anyway, I seriously doubt there was anything a tech could have done. They'd probably have broken the little bugger off too.
 

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Is there any way to attach a bigger image? It's really hard to make that out, especially if the piece is that little white spot next to the dime and not what the dime's sitting on.

And techs are trained to fix problems like this, or replace the device if they would cause undue harm. Just like in medicine, you can give yourself a band aid but you wouldn't want to set your own leg if you broke it.
 
I'll try and scann it in later this evening. The camera's pics of such a small thing don't turn out very well.
 
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