[notsoclever]

Hello

imacG5 OS X 10.4

I inserted a DVD + RW disc recorded from TV (my first ) into drive.

I had forgotten to finalize the disc, although I don't know whether this should have produced such dire consequences as follow:

The disc icon did not appear on desktop and I have been unable to eject it.

I have tried all the suggestions from apple help menu and from this forum. These are

Pressing eject key on keyboard
Restart holding down mouse
Going into firmware with 'eject DVD'. Message was: 'cannot open eject device;
Going into firmware with dir dvd:,\ = " cannot open dir device"

Restarting and pressing down 'X' and attempting to open DVD player by pressing 'eject disc'

However, the DVD player has disappeared with the message:
Initialisation error, a valid DVD player could not be found.
(although it did load at one reboot, but the eject had no effect)

The last thing I have tried is, as suggested here, to gently insert a playing card in optical drive and waggle around. No joy

I have also tried all of the above by shutting down and rebooting.

At the beginning of each procedure, the disc does making its usual little clicks and whirrs, but more quietly than normal.

I am going mad, having spent nearly the whole day on and off trying to fix this.

I have never had any problems of any kind with this machine before.

I would be SO GRATEFUL for any advice.

Looking forward to hearing from someone.

Caroline

[Gordio]

Try holding F12. It's equivalent to eject button. That's how I do it since I use a logitech keyboard, which lacks that button.

[notsoclever]

Thanks, Gordio. Tried this but sadly did not work. Any more ideas?

[JKT]

Have you tried Disk Utility? If the disk shows up in DU, you may be able to select Unmount.

[notsoclever]

Thanks, tried but no joy again. Nothing is working so am miserably thinking it must be a mechanical fault.

However, I’ve discovered something odd which might possibly be an issue. When I went into force quit I noticed Classic was running, although I hadn’t started it. As aforesaid, my DVD player had become inaccessible and a few other apps compromised but when I quit Classic of course everything came back. I am wondering if this disc has somehow made Classic start running somewhere at start-up. Perhaps this is the reason the disc icon in not appearing on desktop and firmware cannot find the eject device?

Does this sound like a possible cause? Should I try to remove Classic?

As before, any advice very welcome – I’ve exhausted myself trying to fix this and keep having to resist the urge to dig the disc out by force!.

Many thanks
C
p.s. the disc is simply a DVD +RW recorded with some reference stuff from TV – although I forgot to finalise it.

[JKT]

As you can't eject by holding the mouse down at boot-time*, it is highly unlikely that it is anything software (or Classic) related and is simply a hardware failure.

* Btw, did you hold it indefinitely until the full boot sequence had completed - not necessary btw as it should eject sooner than that - or just briefly? If just briefly, try again but keep the mouse button held down until it is obvious it isn't going to work... i.e. you get a full boot to the login/desktop.

[notsoclever]

Hooray!

Holding mouse down until fully loaded (3 mins) didn't do it sadly. But I decided to have another go at the playing card thing, but this time I used a plastic laminated card. At the top of the slot I tried very gently pressing against the disc as it spun on start-up, both in front (pressing back) and behind (pressing forward), I don't know which method worked but it suddenly popped out - to my great relief!

The disc is not warped or dirty so I am now a bit worried about inserting another disc just in case it does the same thing again, but I will have to do this at some point

In your experience to you think it is more likely to be the disc or the drive at fault?

Thanks for all help so far.

Caroline

[JKT]

Given I have no practical experience of completely stuck CD/DVDs (at least ones that have been as stubborn as yours - holding the mouse down for the ones I have had trouble with in the past has always worked for me), I would just be speculating. However, there is only really one way to find out - try it with a CD/DVD you know for sure that works (and one that you don't mind losing if things go horribly wrong), or a blank CD/DVD.

[jamil5454]

I don't see how the disc could be the problem. When you reboot holding down the mouse button, the drive doesn't even attempt to read the disc, it just checks to see if one is in there and if it is, then it ejects it. My vote goes to a faulty drive. If your machine is already out of warranty, I'd just open up the drive and take a look inside. It's probably something stupid like an unattached spring.

[notsoclever]

Thanks, but it does seem to have been the disc as I chanced a new one and since then all discs have worked fine. A mystery! (This is an imac G5 so unfortunately you can't open the drive, which would have been very useful - would have also helped to have an ejection hole for the last resort paperclip trick).

Anyway, all is now well on that front, but I now have another horrible problem which I am just about to post. This seemed to be a dream machine and now everything comes along at once...