The organisation that I do voluntary work for uses 2 of these machines, which are now about 10 years old. On one of them, the disc drive jammed with a CD in it, which I have managed to remove, but judging by the gear-grinding sound I believe it to be permanently damaged. The drive itself is a slot-loading IDE CD-R/RW computer drive, which I cannot find a direct replacement for. The UK service agent will sell me one for £138 + Tax, which is a hell of a lot to spend when you consider the age of the units and that I could buy the latest version of this machine for £400.
As an alternative, I have installed a drive which is a newer multi-format (ie DVD-R & RW) type, which although brand-new (old-stock) was only £20, and therefore I thought worth the gamble. Whilst it does work, I am seeing error messages on the display at the 'Finalise' stage, although it does produce a usable disc despite this. Also, the unit does not show 'no-disc' when the drive is empty, which the other machine with the correct drive does.
I am wondering whether there could be a way of overcoming these problems, which I personally could live with, but will I feel be a problem for our membership. I don't have the service manual for the unit, so I hold out a hope that the machine may have a 'service' mode that allows adjustments to be made. The only hint I have that there may be some clever 'setup' mode built into it somewhere is the presence of a 'master/slave' link on the small PCB that plugs into the back of the drive unit. This isn't mentioned in the operation manual, so must be used to set it up, somehow.
Any hopeful suggestions welcome!
As an alternative, I have installed a drive which is a newer multi-format (ie DVD-R & RW) type, which although brand-new (old-stock) was only £20, and therefore I thought worth the gamble. Whilst it does work, I am seeing error messages on the display at the 'Finalise' stage, although it does produce a usable disc despite this. Also, the unit does not show 'no-disc' when the drive is empty, which the other machine with the correct drive does.
I am wondering whether there could be a way of overcoming these problems, which I personally could live with, but will I feel be a problem for our membership. I don't have the service manual for the unit, so I hold out a hope that the machine may have a 'service' mode that allows adjustments to be made. The only hint I have that there may be some clever 'setup' mode built into it somewhere is the presence of a 'master/slave' link on the small PCB that plugs into the back of the drive unit. This isn't mentioned in the operation manual, so must be used to set it up, somehow.
Any hopeful suggestions welcome!