Q: DVD Plays but Audio CD is Ejected
I recently helped a friend update an early 2008 iMac (20-inch) by upping the RAM to 4GB and installing OS X 10.11.5 El Capitan (he was running Snow Leopard). One of the issues he was having before the upgrade (which he told me about after the fact) was that audio CDs had stopped working. He was unable to play them or rip them into iTunes. So when I was on-site orienting him to the new OS, he brought it up and we tried it. Sure enough, no form of audio CD would be read by the optical drive (we tried a computer-burned audio CD and a brand new commercial CD of jazz diva Etta James—both were spun up, and then unceremoniously ejected). I figured that the optical drive was failing.
But here’s where it gets strange. We tried a commercial DVD and, low-and-behold, it spun up, launched DVD Player, and began playing the movie.
Any thoughts on why a video DVD would work fine, but audio CDs would not in the same optical drive?
Thanks,
Barry
Posted on Jul 8, 2016 7:54 AM
CDs and DVDs use different lasers in an optical drive. You can have one fail and the other work.
You can try a drive cleaning disc. If you are lucky it may just be lint blocking the CD laser. If not you will have to replace the drive or get an external drive.
Posted on Jul 8, 2016 8:27 AM