If you find that your Mac’s optical (cd) drive is not reading a disc properly, not at all or just spitting the discs back out again, use these troubleshooting tips as they may help you at least identify what the cause of the problems is.
When having trouble with reading discs try:
- Using another disc of the same type i.e. if you’re using a CD then try another CD, it’s possible that there is a problem with the disc such as scratches or marks that are blocking the disc from being read
- Using another type of disc, if you’re using a CD try testing with a DVD as optical drives use different ways of reading CD and DVD media. If you find that the CD’s work but the DVDs don’t or vice versa then try the next two troubleshooting steps as well.
- Boot to another known working operating system or account. You can boot to another good working operating system by holding down the “alt” key during start up you can select another OS from there if you have one set up.
- Use another account. When we use our accounts for a long time we will eventually download software to our Macs, therefore it is very likely that if you are having issues with your optical drive then it may be linked to your software, so creating another user account is a good way to test to see if there is something you have downloaded that may be causing the Mac to not read or simply eject the disc.
If you have not been able to correct the problem following the above steps, then you should send your Mac for a repair to an Apple Authorised Service Provider such as Amsys.
While the author has taken care to provide our readers with accurate information, please use your discretion before acting upon information based on the blog post. Amsys will not compensate you in any way whatsoever if you ever happen to suffer a loss/inconvenience/damage because of/while making use of information in this blog.