external DVD player and Monterey iOS

For what it's worth, here is what I have lately discovered: A dvd player loaded with a disc will show up on the MacBook Pro Monterey screen after a few minutes. Not seconds, as always before, but minutes. I have tested this three times. I turn to other things and when I come back to it, some minutes later, the icon shows on my screen. Then I can play or rip files to the laptop. This evening I connected a thumb drive via USB C converting dongle, and it is the same thing. Whereas a thumb drive always before showed within a couple of seconds, now it takes minutes. I haven't counted them. But, minutes. So if that helps ease any frustration with this odd quirk in Monterey, that's good.

I got a new Mac Mini in May. It came with Monterey 12.4. I also got a Rioddas external hard drive so that I could download CDs I own onto the computer and my iPhone. Sometimes when I put in a disc, the drive reads it just fine; other times it will not. Mind you, I used to have all these albums on my iPhone before I bought the new Mac. I began having problems with them on the phone and I got a prompt that I knew would cause me to lose all my personal albums, as opposed to those I bought through iTunes. So now I'm trying to reinstall the ones I lost and having endless problems. Either the Rioddas external drive or the Mac will not download maybe one song on an album, and that shuts down the operation entirely. It's monumentally frustrating. Apple Support was not helpful. The first person I talked to hung up on me because she couldn't understand what I was talking about (!) and the second didn't know any more than I did. I believe this is a problem with Monterey, and everything I've read online seems to reaffirm my impression. Does anyone know how I can remedy the situation? Or do I just have to wait until Apple repairs the glitch in Monterey? I just tried to obtain an album I used to have on my iPhone and my old Mac before I got the new Mac and could not do it.

Truly outstanding! Seriously, it doesn't make sense, but your workaround works great! I've had the same problem, external DVD drive worked on my wife's old MacBookPro and would not work on her new MacBookPro even after buying official Apple USB-C to USB-A adapter; the drive would power on but just keep clicking and not work. I then attached a USB hub from my PC to the adapter, attach the drive to the hub, and like magic it starts working like normal.

Thank you so much for sharing this easy fix!

Actually, when I started trying to get the albums to upload onto the computer, if an album wouldn't because of what I described above, I set it aside and tried again the next day, and voilà, it would. Also, at some point thee discs began showing up on my desktop, which they weren't before. It's too weird. I still think it's a glitch in Monterey 12.4 and maybe earlier in Monterey. Right now it's just patience. Each of us seems to figure out a way to get what we want, so...over to Apple.

I have an M1 Macbook Pro running Monterey 12.5. My current CD drive is not recognized by my machine. I really don't want to start buying different CD/DVD players to see which one will work. I just want to transfer my CDs to my computer. Did anyone find a unit that worked without any work arounds?

Mine is a Rioddas, very cheap (less than $20). My problem with it is that sometimes it doesn't appear on my desktop when I try to record a CD with it. Also, sometimes it balks at recording a particular disk. But if I wait a while—a few hours or a day—and try again, it works fine. It can only be a problem with the software on my new Mac Mini. The old Mini I had had a port for recording disks, but Apple, in its endless wisdom—or as I suspect to force me to subscribe to Apple Music, which I won't do—took away the port at some point in time. I see no purpose in paying for an electronic transfer of music I already own on CDs. I like my Apple devices, but there are qualities about them that drive me bananas.

I bought two different USB-C hubs and two drives in addition to the one that originally quit working after Monterey. If someone has a make/model hub that works with MacBook Pro, M1, on Monterey 12.5, please post it. I think my first Monterey was 12.1 or 12.2 but I didn't use the old drive for several months. I know I had the problem on 12.3. Yes, I have pluggied in other USB-A devices to be sure the hubs were working.

My drive has been plugged into a hub for two weeks and Disk Utility doesn't list it. I did that with a different drive as well. I know Apple Corp thinks disks are out of date but a lot of other people want the disks I used to produce. Do I need to buy a device that doesn't have M1 or M2 processors? That's a VERY expensive workaround.

Honestly, I'm not that big a nerd about my computer. If it works, fine with me. So I don't know the different USB conventions. I bought a new hub for all my devices (the disc player, a scanner, a laser printer, an old inkjet printer that Epson doesn't support anymore, a device to upload the cards from my digital camera, and an external hard drive) that contains 9 ports, which is what I needed after I lost the built-in CD/DVD player/recorder in the old Mini. I assume that most of them are up to date, but I haven't tried to use the inkjet printer since I got the new Mac. I think I will end up replacing that printer up the way. As I said, the CD/DVD player/recorder is kind of a hit or miss proposition, but it will work if one is patient.

I have a MacBook Pro 2021 and was having trouble getting an LG external cd/dvd player to be seen by my Mac on Monterey 12.5.1. I tried the USB /thunderbolt port adapter I have and it didn't work. Then I tried a multi-connecter and it worked. Basically this plugs into 2 thunderbolt ports to work. I'm guessing maybe it needed more power to run the cd/dvd drive? This is the adapter I got from Amazon:

MacBook Pro/Air USB Accessories with 3 USB 3.0 Ports, TF/SD Card Reader, Thunderbolt 3 PD Port, USB C Adapter for MacBook Pro/Air 13" 15" 16" Compatible with MacBook Pro/Air 2021-2016 by RayCue.

Hope this helps someone!

The problem (one of them at least) appears to be MacBooks with M type processors with Monterey macOS. I have Is a MacBook Pro with M1 processors and Monterey 12.3, 12.4 then 12.5.  My external drive worked fine before upgrading to Monterey so my problem wasn’t the power.  Apple seems to not care about this problem at all. There are workarounds but some seem flakey.  Some said to use a hub but two hubs and three drives later nothing worked for me. Thanks to other comments I tried I’ve found that the Rioddas ($19 Amazon) external drive seems to work fine with a hub. It even works fine with an Anker “USB C Adapter.”  It’s about an inch long and comes as a two pack for $14 (Amazon).  With that, if you in a DVD or CD it will begin to play immediately. If you put in a blank disk, a window opens prompting you to open Disk Utility which will list the dive (Slimtype DVD).  I just burned a full DVD in 12 minutes so throughput is not a problem. When searching for Rioddas on Amazon, the drive is there but the name is only in the photo. The name is in the detail after you go there. 

I have a Matshita DVD-RAM UJBE2 drive that I've not used for 18 months, connected directly to my Mac mini (M1 2020) running Monterey 12.6. I tried getting it to read a CD yesterday and at first got no response. I checked out the posts here and didn't find any that really helped. Idly opening and closing the CD tray three or four times though (more in hope than expectation!) the CD was recognised by the Apple Music app and all was as functional as before..

Hi - I had this issue with Big Sur after an update. Installed Monterey and had same problem.

Tried a diff drive and it works. The disc icon appears within seconds on my desktop.

I'm able to listen to music and transfer audio tracks to my mac mini M1.

The drive I'm using is a MthsTec USB 3.0 and Type-C I paid $100 in 2020. It's now selling for $80. Weird the price went down.

They list this drive as available on Amazon.

Hope this helps someone.

James G in Santa Rosa

Thank you . Even In my case a workaround worked. Connecting the USB-C dvd writer to a USB-C hub solve the problem. It's so strange but happy that at least it works.

The drive will not show in finder until a CD is inserted into the drive.