# What is wrong with my DVD R/RW drive? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [April 3, 2011, 10:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-wrong-with-my-dvd-r-rw-drive/577081 "2011-04-03T22:17:59Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![brujaja](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4af34b/32.png) [@brujaja](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brujaja)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2011, 10:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-wrong-with-my-dvd-r-rw-drive/577081/1 "2011-04-03T22:17:59Z")
This is my current drive, and it has always worked before. It will not read or recognize any disk that I insert. When there is no disk in the drive, I can right-click its icon and go “eject,” and it will open. (Its light, of course, is on.) As soon as I put a disk in, it will freeze up completely. At that point, when I right-click the icon, I get no context menu, just the optical drive equivalent of an hourglass cursor. Eventually, the menu comes back, and clicking “open” or “explore” shows me an empty drive. I have tried different disks; no change. ---
**Author:** ![jasonh300](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/46a35a/32.png) [@jasonh300](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jasonh300)\ **Post date:** [April 4, 2011, 2:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-wrong-with-my-dvd-r-rw-drive/577081/2 "2011-04-04T02:33:59Z")
The drive crapped out. Mine did the exact same thing about a week ago. I spent $30 on [tigerdirect.com](http://tigerdirect.com) and got a new drive and installed it today. When I removed the old drive, I saw that I’d written the install date on the side of it in sharpie marker…11/2002. Guess it was time for a new one! ---
**Author:** ![brujaja](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4af34b/32.png) [@brujaja](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brujaja)\ **Post date:** [April 4, 2011, 3:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-wrong-with-my-dvd-r-rw-drive/577081/3 "2011-04-04T03:41:23Z")
Aw, crap. I’ll bet you’re right; my DVD drive probably went to high school with yours. On the bright side, Tiger Direct **is** awesome! Thanks for the advice. ---
**Author:** ![EvilTOJ](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ee59a6/32.png) [@EvilTOJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EvilTOJ)\ **Post date:** [April 4, 2011, 9:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-wrong-with-my-dvd-r-rw-drive/577081/4 "2011-04-04T09:25:56Z")
Every CD/DVD reader I’ve had that physically died did the same thing. ---
**Author:** ![EinsteinsHund](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/einsteinshund/32/8400_2.png) [@EinsteinsHund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EinsteinsHund)\ **Post date:** [April 4, 2011, 9:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-wrong-with-my-dvd-r-rw-drive/577081/5 "2011-04-04T09:35:49Z")
Well, if the drive is that old, I guess it’s best to get a new one, but if you are cheap, you can try to clean the lens. You have to disassemble the drive, then find the lens which [looks like this](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Optical_drive_lens.JPG) ( [here’s a view](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:CDRom.png) of the whole inside of an optical drive). Just clean the lens with a cotton swab and a little naphtha or alcohol, and there’s a good chance that the drive will work again. I did that with a lot of optical drives/players (I’m a smoker, so my drives tend to get easily contaminated), and it always worked.