Laptop DVD drive

[Hurlshort]

My laptop, a 3-year old Gateway, is having problems with the DVD drive. It doesn't seem to be reading anymore when I put in a CD. Everything else is working fine.

 

I've never really worked on a laptop, so I'm not sure how difficult repairs are. Am I better off taking it to a shop? Is it expensive?

 

I was planning on buying a new laptop in a year or so, so I'm trying to weigh whether I should spend money getting it fixed or just drop the cash on a new one.

[Gfted1]

IIRC, most laptops use a modular design for their optical readers in case you ever want to swap out a CD/DVD for say a 3.5" drive. You should be able to flip the laptop over and somewhere near the slot for the drive should be a release switch that will allow you to slide out the drive in one piece. At that point you will see a sticker on the drive with the manufacturer and part number so all you have to do is call Gateway if you want the exact thing again or simply cross reference that part on the intertube.

[Hurlshort]

I looked into buying a replacement drive, and it seems pretty pricey at $139.00. It actually seems like the external CDRW drives are cheaper. Is there any reason this wouldn't be a good idea?

 

I'm also trying to still weigh wether it isn't better just to get a new laptop altogether. For $400 I can get one that is a good deal faster.

[Gfted1]

The CD player on my PC crapped out months ago and, for me, an external CD drive has been fine. I use it when I need it and put it away for the other 99% of the time. Granted, I almost never need to use my CD drive and Im on a desktop while your on a laptop so you may have a much higher usage and/or not want to hump around an additional component.

 

If you can get a new, better, laptop for $400.00 then Id go for that. Whats the monetary difference between that and just a drive? A few hundred dollars? And you will get a performance increase and a several years worth of use.

[Hurlshort]

Yeah...she wants a Macbook now. I told her "not in my household!"

 

 

But then I relented. I told her she's going to have to come up with her own money for it though, I'm not dropping $1200 for a laptop unless it can run the best games at the highest settings. I'll probably cover half.