Too bad for Mandrake or LG... - Hope the problem get's fixed though and that the "culprit" is large enough to offer upgrades or compensation to those affected.

A little update - I wrote Mandrake about the issue - Here is their reply:

There *is* a bug in few LG cdrom-drives firmware. That bug, linked with a
functionality of MandrakeLinux 9.2 kernel (2.4.22) can physically damage a LG
cdrom drive.

Please note that:
* We have identified where the problem came from.
* To date our technical teams are working on a proper way to avoid this.
* All Linux distribution based on kernel 2.4.22 is subject to this problem.
* Even network installation is not a solution to that problem as kernel may
affect LG cd-rom during common use.
* MandrakeSoft updated its errata page (see
http://www.mandrakelinux.com/en/errata.php3).
* This problem might not appears on some LG cdrom-drives, and most of LG
cd-burner, dvd-reader, etc.
* MandrakeLinux 9.1 is not subject to this problem.
* Users might not encoure such problems with non-LG cdrom-drives.

Do not hesitate to recontact us for further information.

END QUOTE

Do not hesitate to recontact us for further information. <--- NOTICE THEIR REPLY...

I would suggest every user affected by this problem after following the case via the suggested links - if needed! To write a KIND letter asking Mandrake how they (i.e. the user) and Mandrake by cooperating fully can fix this problem to the users full satisfaction.

Good Luck

Completely unrelated, but still bad coincidence for you:-

On Aug 26th this year, a car smashed me from behind. I stopped and checked everything over, and it looked fine, the car behind was also undammaged.

I thought we could leave it be!

Anyway, I went to start my bike up, but it just would not???

Anyway, I looked it over, but a big problem, is that its a GoldWing, and most of the gubbins, is hidden behind the plastic, so I told the guy that I needed to have his details, and get the insurance to have a peek.

Anyway, it turned out the Alternator was shot!

WTF????

£700 to sort it out, and the insurance wont pay up cos its nothing to do with the knock???

Bullshot... Utter Bullshot.

Just to follow up on this LG cdrom issue, saw this thread on the gentoo forum reporting the same problem:

http://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic.php?t=100348

It appears that any OS/software that issues a "flush_cache" command to the affected LG drives will fry them because LG took a standard ATAPI command, flush_cache, and redefined it to initiate a firmware upgrade. In other words, these LG drives do not comply with ATAPI standards. The flush_cache command is used to clear the write buffer on CD-RW drive and apparently LG did not anticipate that this command would be issued to a standard cdrom. However, in some linux kernels the command is issued to determine whether the drive is a CD-RW, thus the problem.

JT don't through out that drive just yet. LG has a fix that can revive your dead drive:

http://www.mandrakeusers.org/index.php?showtopic=9483