I currently own a Dell Inspiron 9400 laptop. A while back the DVD RW started to fail, (up to 20 mins to transfer a 700MB file), anyway even though it was just out of warranty I contacted Dell who agreed to replace the drive, unfortunately the one they sent as a replacement was little better, (takes about 17 mins to transfer the same file!!). Long story short I need to buy a new DVD RW for the Inspiron 9400 laptop but do not want to pay the £100 for a crap replacement. Does anyone know the names of other reliable drives that I can get at a reasonable price? Please and thank you for your time and advice.
Dvd drives for laptops will fail alot quicker than those for desktops. They just can't handle the same amout of work. I would suggest you look for an external burner. It will last much longer and minimize the wear and tear on your burner. I have an Acer laptop whose dvd/rw drive failed. Since my warranty expired, I knew I would have to pay alot to have Acer replace it. A friend of mine works on laptops and was able to replace mine with a dvd/rw from an identical Acer laptop he was sending back. I now use an external burner for the majority of what I burn, and use the internal one sparingly.
Thanks for the reply. I use my main desktop for the majority of burning, but I watch a lot of stuff and listen to music on the laptop. I tend to transfer more files than burn so the burner element won't get a lot of use. I had thought about an external drive but I figured it would be too much hassle so decided to stick with the internal.
I used to use my laptop alot in addition to my desktop, till it failed on me. The drive always sounded a little off when I first got it, but after alot of burns (more than I care to admit) it failed. I have an external burner that is usb powered, so the only plug in the wall is the laptops. DOne great so far, 6 months and counting, and not a coaster in the bunch!
Honestly, I'm not sure. I don't know if your model uses ide or sata connections. A friend of mine swapped out the drives for me...only cost me $150us. Fairly cheap compared taking it to a shop and having them do it for me. There are a few on here who work on computers and laptops. They may be able to help you out more than I can.
The drive has a sata type connection, it is very similar but I dont think it is exactly the same. The drive to replace is a TSST corp DVD+-RW TS-L632H.
Got the solution from Skybird at Dell Community forums PIO Mode is the problem. This article, which includes a Quick Solution in Step 1 should resolve it .............. http://winhlp.com/node/10 But thanks again for your help rtm27
Would you mined sharing what brand/model external your using? I'm in the same situation, with an acer with to many burns on it. Tried one from I/O magic- (Only thing available locally) and it only burned about 4 disc before it started creating coasters. Thank you for your time.
I'm using an LG 8x external burner with lightscribe. I got mine from newegg.com. Here is the link, tho when I bought mine, it was about $20 cheaper, as being a new item back in february. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827136136
