Q: How can I disable my dvd drive?

The suggestion and links I posted should disable the drive as you asked in your first post.

regards

I have the exact same problem. Got myself an external but the repeated wheezing and a loud grating noise that occurs every 5 mins or so is driving me mad

I'm on an iMac Mid 2011.

Anyone successful in just opening up their iMac and removing the drive? or any unix code to disable power to it?

thatmattdude wrote:

 

I have the exact same problem. Got myself an external but the repeated wheezing and a loud grating noise that occurs every 5 mins or so is driving me mad

 

I'm on an iMac Mid 2011.

Anyone successful in just opening up their iMac and removing the drive? or any unix code to disable power to it?

There are directions on iMac disassembly, repair and replacement posted around the 'net, if you're so inclined.  A DuckDuckGo web search for /imac 2011 dvd repair/ turned up some instructions.

If you don't want to disassemble the iMac yourself – parts can potentially break during disassembly, after all — then most local repair services will likely be willing to disconnect the drive power for less than the cost of a repair, not that DVD drives are all that expensive these days and particularly not once you have the iMac opened up.

I'm not aware of a command or a sequence that can disable the detection and configuration of the internal DVD device — well, not short of disabling all USB DVD drives connected, and I'd not recommend that path.