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TICKET ARCHIVE -> OS X won't read CD's

ting - Dec 11, 2005 - 6:20 pm

After iTunes failed to complete burning a music audio (not MP3) CD, my Combo Drive no longer read any more CD's (black or manufactured), nor DVD's. After I insert the CD, I hear spinning sounds, but after about 5 seconds of spinning, it is ejected automatically. The desktop doesn't show the CD at all. I've tried resetting NVRAM and PRAM already, but it didn't help. Any other ideas?

ting - Dec 11, 2005 - 7:14 pm

I am running eMac G4 1.25 GHz 512 RAM combo drive panther 10.3.9

ishan - Dec 11, 2005 - 8:54 pm

Does the System Profiler app see the Combo Drive? If it doesn't, you may simply have a loose data or power cable. On an eMac, though, I don't know that that's a DIY fix.

If the System Profiler _does_ see the Combo Drive, you might try one of the laser lens cleaner disks. Sometimes, it's just a dirty lens.

HTH and please let us know what happens. Have a safe and happy Holiday.

ting - Dec 11, 2005 - 11:43 pm

THanks for the fast response. System Profiler does see the Combo drive (it's listed under the ATA Device Treet. I've also tried laser lens cleaner, but it didn't help.

I'm convinced that the inferior blank CD, which caused my system to crash, is causing this problem. Is there anyway I can reset the CDROM?

Thanks

ishan - Dec 12, 2005 - 5:27 am

Unfortunately, resetting the CD=ROM would require you to access the CD-ROM which is hard to do on an eMac (and very expensive). For practical purposes, you might want to consider using an external CD/DVD burner which would be a) pretty cheap and b) much faster than what is is you eMac.

ting - Dec 24, 2005 - 2:29 am

I found out that my combo drive reads DVDs but not CDs... for CDs, it simply ejects it after reading it....any ideas on a fix?

ishan - Dec 24, 2005 - 8:23 pm

No, I don't, but I'll put your question back into the pool and maybe someone else has a suggestion.

Have a safe and happy Holiday.

biggianthead06 - Dec 26, 2005 - 5:21 am

Have you tried using a Bootable CD of some sort at all? either an OS X disc or something like diskwarrior etc. would probably be helpful...

the combo drive actually uses separate lasers for reading CDs and DVDs. It's therefore possible that the reading laser itself was somehow damaged. Unfortunately there's no easy way to assess this problem; my thoughts would be the following:

1. try running a bootable CD. if you don't have any handy, if you do have a computer available which can burn ISOs I would suggest downloading an ISO for the ubuntu linux PowerPC liveCD from www.ubuntulinux.org as it's a freely available bootable disc for your mac. At this point, we should try to isolate whether it's a hardware or a software issue, which means any bootable CD, OS X or otherwise, will suffice.

2. if your computer will not boot from a CD, then we're probably looking at a physical problem with your drive (probably the CD read laser), which means you'll likely have to consider sending it in or making do with an external.

Happy holidays to you; sorry that your ticket got lost in the fray, but hopefully we can work towards resolving this issue.

-Bo