First of all, what a nice FAQ this group has put out. So far I haven't found a better resource.
I have an NEC DVD burner (3540A I think). It's only a few months old and until recently it's worked perfectly. I took it out of my PC case and inadvertantly opened the drive door while the DVD was upside down (power was on). I didn't think anything of it at the time, but since reinstalling it, it hasn't worked.
Basically, there's a clicking sound, almost like someone clattering their teeth for a couple seconds. The sounds stops, then repeats a few times after that. Seems to be seeking or something like that, but it does the same sound whether or not a disc is in the drive. It even makes the sound (once) at startup before my OS (xp) loads. Inserting a disc starts the series of clicks all over again.
Unit has power. Drive door opens and closes normally.
I can't help but feel this is a mechanical problem, as if some sort of latch, switch or spring has slipped out of place. I unscrewed the bottom of the drive and took a look but nothing looked out of place to my untrained eye. I grounded myself an removed some of the circut boards to get a better look, but again, nothing seemed out of place. With everything back in place I powered the drive and observed.
I'm not sure if my terms are right, but from inside I can see the "pickup" move forward along the "rack sled". It gets very close to what appears to be the "spindle motor" or "spindle platter" and just before it contacts it stutters and that's the clicking sound. It never hits, but the motion makes it look like it's tapping several times before stopping, then it starts over. The actual sound may be coming from the brass threaded rod that turns and moves the "pickup" forward. It's very possible that the mechancial problem has nothing to do with the parts I'm viewing. Nothing appears to be functioning wrong.
Image (not my drive):
One last thing... near the front (door side) of the drive, there's a kind of... how do I explain. Imagine a circle with two-thirds cut away and the remaining slice is attached at what would have been the center of the circle. On this center it is allowed to move clockwise and counterclockwise to a limited degree. Seems this part is effected somehow by the opening and closing of the door or the release of same. The only thing strange about it is that it seems to move too freely. It looks like something that should require some kind of tension like that provided by a small spring, but that's just speculation. Again, an image would be nice.
That's all I know. It's a $60 DVD burner so I can replace it if necessary. I'm only hoping this is a common enough problem that someone can identify it and give me a fix. I'm not adept enough to start testing electronic aspects.
Even if you can't help, can anyone offer a link that shows me some good internal DVD images? My intuition is that this is something simple.
Thanks if you can help in any way.