Sticker in optical drive Imac 24"-danger or not..

[rotatoe]

Hi,

I inserted a labeled CD in my Imac's optical drive (yes, stupid mistake). It got stuck and after a couple of attempts I successfully removed the CD....but I now have a paper sticker stuck in the drive.

1) Could this damage other parts of the computer? Or did the sticker stay in the optical drive?

2) I can no longer use the optical drive so I am thinking of purchasing an external one, does anyone know if the MacBook Air SuperDrive is also compatible with an Imac system?

Thanks in advance for your replies

 

[AuricBlue]

The sticker most likely stayed in the optical drive. Drives are usually in their own enclosures, so somehow the sticker would have to wriggle its way out of any tiny (compared to the label sticker) holes in the drive enclosure.

As to damaging the computer in other ways, it shouldn't. I can only think of a couple scenarios that it might. 1. The drive somehow starts drawing more power than normal and puts undue stress on the power supply and adds extra heat. I don't think this is very likely. 2. The drive floods the bus with error messages thus bogging down the OS. Again, not very likely, but you never know. I am neither an expert in optical drive innards or bus operations, but experience tells me that the computer should mostly ignore the drive as long as you don't use it.

As to your 2nd question. As far as I know, the MacBook Air SuperDrive only works with specific models that are designed for it (it draws extra power over USB than standard, IIRC) like the MBA and the Mac Mini Server.

But! Other World Computing sells external USB and FireWire DVD burners for less than the cost of Apple's drive. Check out http://eshop.macsales.com/search/external%20optical for their selection. Not an employee of theirs, just a satisfied customer. I'm sure similar drives can be found elsewhere.

Good luck!

 

[IndustrialSpace]

...so you can't insert labeled CDs into a mac drive?


Please tell me you're kidding!

 

[rotatoe]

Thanks for your reply