iMac scratching my disc?

I tried an old, obsolete, CD in and out of the drive several times. It was OK if I was VERY careful to slide the disc in without touching the metal of the casing. As soon as I got careless and touched the iMac case with the playing side then the disc became scratched and gouged.
I've taken to making an ISO copy of anything I want to insert into the Mac using MS Windows and transferring it to the Mac on a USB hard disk.
How about a modification, or a protective insert for the slot, to prevent it scratching our expensive, and important discs?

Further to my last post, Apple did replace my iMac with one of the newer models. I was delighted to see that the drive slot has now been widened and lined with plastic (as was my old first-gen MacBook Pro), and this has completely resolved the case-scratching-discs issue.

You are very lucky!!! Apple has decided that it is 'user error' that scratches discs! You only have to back over the last 8 pages to know that this is complete bull!! They do not want to address the problem, so I think that the next step is to become very active in bringing this design/manufacturing flaw to the public's attention. My last iMac had a faulty firewire circuit, which I was unable to have rectified until it was far too late!! My faith in Apple has vanished. I am in the process of making flyers etc. to post at all the libraries, UVic, UCalgary, UAlberta etc.,public libraries, etc,etc. A better job needs to be done about informing the public. I would have thought that Apple would have paid attention to what happened with Toyota last year.

My imac is doing the exact same thing - and has done it to my 2 most recent sims 3 discs. It's very frustrating - EA will help by providing replacements if you have registered, but I'm curious as to what Apple's responsibility is. After all, its my computer (brand new, fully updated) that is eating the discs.

My new Imac just scratched 3 out of 5 disks when I was using DVD Studio Pro as well as when I was transferring files

I've had this same problem. I'm 64 years old, bought my 6th Mac in November 2010 (my first was a Mac Plus). Four of my game DVD's have been scratched by my new Mac, all four exhibiting the "cat scratch" pattern described in this thread.

After radically changing my disc insertion and retrieval habits -- by being basically "maniacally careful" when inserting and retrieving my discs; I've suffered no additional scratches.

The bottom line:

1) Unless Apple intended the current iMacs to be bought and used by extraordinarily careful people only, the design of the casing surrounding the optical drive is seriously defective.

2) I would never recommend purchasing one of these new iMacs to anyone who has children. It is clear to me that no-one under the age of 14 (at a minimum) would be capable of exercising the extreme caution required when inserting or extracting discs from these iMacs without regularly damaging discs.

3) Apple needs to accept responsibility for and correct this deficiency.

I finally got tired of the problem and after my son had damaged his OS and Restore discs designed a polycarbonate sleeve which solves the problem entirely.
Now you can insert your discs without accidental damage
I have tooling in process to have these available by early February
Anyone interested can get these by contacting me directly for more info.

I have posted elsewhere too but after getting tired of my sons iMac scratching 'new' CD's and DVD's I now have made a polycarbonate sleeve for the slot drive and now can insert a CD 100 times and still be able to read and write without scratching.
If you want more info contact me directly.

Same thing happend to me but never happened again after I bought a mac slot cover from toptekkie in vancouver, it stopped my discs from ever being scratched again. Topptekkie will have more stock soon I think they will be on ebay in the next few weeks.

The exact thing has happened to me - I keep my disks in perfect condition - now some of them are scratched to **** on one side, like someone's taken a nail to it. This is the iMac drive - it cannot be anything else.

I am considering starting a class action lawsuit because of this disc scratching problem. If you are willing to be a part of it, please contact me at leahsodyssey@yahoo.com I love Apple, but this is something they really need to fix.

I have kind of the same problem. I went to restore my macbook but only disc 1 worked. Disc 2 keeps reading error and its not letting me click back. I don't know what to do. Help me!