Replacing a CD drive -- how easy is it?

[DeeBye]

How easy is it to replace a CD drive? I know I could Google for this information, but I'd much rather hear from people who can give me real world advice.

My Philips CDRW drive kicked the bucket. It won't read disks at all. Don't ever buy a Philips CDRW, because they are loud as hell and suck big time.

I have an old generic 52x CD drive residing in my dead computer. As far as I know, it still works. I'd like to transfer it to my non-dead computer.

What is the best way to go about this? Is it easier to uninstall the old drive and install the new (old) one? Or is it easier to just add the drive to whatever is already there?

Can anyone walk me through this procedure?

[yangman]

These days, CD-ROM drives rarely need to have its drivers installed seperately.

Uninstall the old drivers, swap the drives, reboot, and Windows should detect the new-old drive, configure it, and activate appropriate drivers automatically.

[Nystul]

In terms of the physical process, the hardest part is securing the drive to the case. This may or may not involve drive rails, but in any case a lot of screwdriver work... pay attention when you pull the old one out so you know how to put the other one in.

Otherwise, the connections are pretty simple. You've got a line from the power supply, and an IDE cable hooked to the motherboard, to plug in to the back of the drive. If you swap the drives, it's just a matter of not losing track of those two cables while you remove the old drive and secure the new one. There is also a slave/master jumper on the back of the drive. You probably don't need to worry about this, but if you have another drive (a hard drive, for instance) running off the same IDE cable, you will need to make sure it is set properly. You may also see small sockets for digital and analog cables to run to the sound card. These should not be connected to anything. The CD audio can pass as data through the IDE cable, which is generally now a better way to handle it.

Before you do any of this though, have you tried using a lens-cleaning CD on your "broken" drive? You may recall my rant at Jim's a while back... My DVD drive would not read any disks at all, and cleaning the lens fixed the problem. I suspect that a dirty lens is a far more common problem than actually burning out a drive.

[DeeBye]

Before you do any of this though, have you tried using a lens-cleaning CD on your "broken" drive?  You may recall my rant at Jim's a while back... My DVD drive would not read any disks at all, and cleaning the lens fixed the problem.  I suspect that a dirty lens is a far more common problem than actually burning out a drive.

Good idea. I'll try this first.

[Bob]

on jumpers:
look at the back of your current drive (there should be a jumper diagram) and figure out what your current drive is set as. Following the guide on the 'new' drive, set it to the same and make sure to plug the same IDE plug (the big cable) in as came out the back of the old one.

You may also see small sockets for digital and analog cables to run to the sound card. These should not be connected to anything. The CD audio can pass as data through the IDE cable, which is generally now a better way to handle it.

oh...excuse me while I open my case.

-Bob

[Saxywoo]

and make sure to plug the same IDE plug (the big cable) in as came out the back of the old one.

If you aren't sure where the red striped side of the data cable should go onto Pin 1, which is on the side of the connection closest to the power input on the drive.

-SaxyCorp

[anarchae]

Just swap them out and you should have no problems. I replaced a drive this evening in minutes. Unplug the cables from the hosed drive, slide it out, slide replacement in and hook cables back up the same way as old. Plug and play is great!

[Guest]

edited