My iMac no longer reads dvds or play cds, but it used to.

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Level 1

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My iMac no longer reads dvds or play cds, but it used to.

I'm not sure how long my disc driver hasn't worked because I dont watch dvds or listen to cds much. However it has worked in the past. But I have recently tried to watch a yoga video, documentary dvds but it would not read my dvd and spat it back out.

I did a little research which recommended having my system preferences for CD/DVD's set to play dvd's in DVD player, music cds in iTunes, picture cds in Photos app etc. However in DVD player app - it just says disc not supported... However, even using iTunes to play a music cd - I attempted to play a disc a few weeks ago it would not play. It read it long enough to come up with the album name and names of each song, but wouldn't actually play a song and would eject itself.

I'm no apple expert, is there something I can do to enable discs to be read and work again? Or is this a result of upgrading to - macOS 10.13.6, I tried as long as I could to not upgrade. I can't remember what issue arose that caused me to upgrade.

I dont have the means to get a earlier model, and I don't have any issues with using a older model iMac, it has definitely served me a 100x better than any Windows device/laptop/hard drive computer has ever served me.

Thanks in advance.

iMac 21.5″, macOS 10.13

Posted on Aug 13, 2020 10:37 PM

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Answer 1

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Eau Rouge

Level 8

42,554 points

Aug 13, 2020 11:24 PM in response to Maddy0ra

Do you have any cans of compressed air, you can alway buy a can and try blowing the air through the

CD/DVD drive slot, this is to blow any dirt off the lenses that may have built up over time.

Alway use the canon compressed air upright, if used at an angle you could spray moisture

into you mac which could harm your mac more.

You can also use a CD cleaning disk, but as the reader is being problematic it may not work.

Is the reader making any unusual noises, such as clicking.

CD/DVD readers do tend to fail and this may be the case with yours, you can also buy an

external CD/DVD reader/ writer, not too expensive but you must make sure it is compatible

with macOS High Sierra 10.13.6 or above.

If you were to buy a newer model mac at some stage you will notice that none of them come with built in

CD/DVD drives so having an external CD/DVD drive would be a sensible purchase.

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My iMac no longer reads dvds or play cds, but it used to.

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