On 06/03/2008, Douglas A. Tutty <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > On Wed, Mar 05, 2008 at 05:48:05PM -0500, H.S. wrote: > > In a Dell laptop, Inspiron 5160, the optical drive appeared to have died > > a few days ago. The disk stopped spinning, Fn+Eject stopped working and > > the button on the drive also stopped working. Attempting to eject lights > > the LED on the drive, but the tray is never ejected. I had thought the > > drive was dead (maybe the motor had died). > > > > However, it started to work a few days ago out of the blue! Today > > though, it has again stopped working. > > > > I wonder what is going. It is dual boot laptop. It started to work when > > the user was fiddling with Nero in Windows (it had stopped working after > > the user first started using Nero). > > > > Are there any tools in Linux which I can use to see what is going on? > > The laptop is long out of warranty so calling Dell is not an option. > > > To eliminate a software problem with the drive, the eject button should > work during POST and during BIOS screens. > > To eliminate a mechanical problem, with the power off, does the > emergency eject hole (activated with a paper-clip) unlatch the drive so > you can slide it open manually? It should close on power-on. With it > open, check for foreign material. > > An intermittant problem can often be an electrical connector. I've > never even seen a Dell laptop so I don't know how to get at the > connections. I don't suppose the whole drive is ejectable (like on my > old ThinkPad)?
The instructions for removing the optical drive from the Inspiron 5160 are here: http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/ins5160/en/SM/upgrades.htm#wp1106797 Dotan Cohen http://what-is-what.com http://gibberish.co.il א-ב-ג-ד-ה-ו-ז-ח-ט-י-ך-כ-ל-ם-מ-ן-נ-ס-ע-ף-פ-ץ-צ-ק-ר-ש-ת A: Because it messes up the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing?
