So I've been having problems with the SuperDrive in my MPB for a while. It has gotten particularly bad lately. When taking in DVDs, it attempts to spin up about 4 or 5 times, but is never successful. The disc never mounts and ejects after the 4th or 5th unsuccessful spin-up. This happens with any non-blank DVD (movies, Leopard install disc, etc.) It will take blank DVDs just fine; however, it has problems burning them (7 out of 10 burns fail due to "hardware errors".
CDs, on the other hand, never show this problem. It reads them and burns them without a hiccup. From what I've read, since the SuperDrive has different lasers for CDs and DVDs, something is wrong with the DVD laser and the SuperDrive may need replacement.
The thing is, it doesn't fail to read/burn DVDs all the time. Only most of the time.
So I decided to see if I could figure anything out before taking it in for repair. And surprisingly, I think I narrowed down the situations where I encounter problems:
1.) If I start my computer up with a DVD in the drive, it will eject it before starting up. As long as the computer is on after that, it will not mount a DVD. (Can't even boot from the OS X disc this way)
2.) If I start my computer WITHOUT a DVD in the drive, it almost always accepts and mounts the first DVD I put in. After I eject that DVD though, 98% of the time, it won't mount another until I restart. (I'm able to hold Option while starting up, then insert and mount from the Leopard DVD).
So the fairly specific nature of getting DVDs to work has me questioning whether the drive has actually failed or not. I'd say the signs point to failure, but I'm not entirely sure. Just wanted to see if anyone had any thoughts before I take it in for service.
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