Question about dvd drive on 5742 acer

thurgood

I have this situation where my dvd drive opens all by itself every now and then. As well, it has problems recognizing cds... I was wondering whether to replace the drive itself or that small connector tab on the motherboard to which the dvd drive plugs in to. Don't know whether the symptoms point to one or the other. 

JackE

First try to re-seat the connector a half-dozen or so times to clean the contacts. Also vacuum or blow air in and around the tray to remove any debris that might've accumulated around the LEDs and detectors. CD/DVD discs themselves can be difficult or impossible to read due to scratches, dust, fingerprints, warpage and age especially if writeable. Cleaning the discs with Windex or rubbing alcohol sometimes helps. And a disc that is unreadable on one drive may sometimes be readable on another drive due to small mechanical drive variations. Though more reliable than a floppy disc drive, CD/DVD drives suffer many of the same drawbacks and are thus becoming increasingly rare in laptops due to the much higher reliability, faster access and lower costs of using USB sticks. Jack E/NJ