CD drive cleaning discs
 

I haven't used one of those CD drive-cleaning discs in living memory, but after my CD/DVD drive keeps making conspicious errors (failing to burn properly or falsely reporting there's no disc), I suppose I might need to clean it. I vaguely remember having to play the discs so they clean the drive while spinning. Are there any that won't run in a Linux CD player, or can I buy the first cleaning disc I see at the store? I'd "google" it, but all the search results seem to concern "cleaning" viruses/malware, not dirt.

It's just a disc with a little brush mounted on it. As long as the drive will spin it, it will clean the laser head.

As MS3FGX says they're just a CD with brushes on. I have used one and it seemed like it may have worked and in theory they could well work. As for them causing problems with a "Linux CD player" I'm not sure what you mean by that? The CD ROM drive is the same whichever OS you're using so the OS is irrelevant.

Yes, I was skeptical that there could really be a problem, but I haven't used one of these discs in some years, and wanted to "cover all bases" by finding out. I'd be pretty annoyed If I bought one and then discovered that, for any reason, it wouldn't start spinning when I clicked play on a Linux music-playing application.

Or is the short spinning time after I insert the disc all the time it needs to clean the drive, which would make Linux irrelevant to it? I supposed not; I supposed I had to use a media player to keep it running for a while.

You would have to play the CD in an application, yes, as the one I had at least had the brushes where the third track was marked or something. I can't see there being a problem under Linux though but I wish I knew where mine was to test it.

If you can see the laser lens you can always use some compressed air on it.

I don't know exactly what the laser lens looks like. Hmm, I suppose it's obviously the red spot near the back which I saw only now.

I'm trying compressed air, but I'm skeptical that it would help much long-term, because of the direction I have to blow the air.

It's the round glass eye looking thingy on top ;)
see: http://i.istockimg.com/file_thumbvie...-cd-player.jpg

IMHO, those "clean-cds" are waste of time and money if it's possible to replace your cd/dvd device.

I don't know about that, but the drive might very well be broken even though it's at most four years old. It can't burn a disc (image or audio) without quickly failing, but my other optical drive can finish a burn (if not always) despite that it's probably twelve years old. I suppose I should take a hint from that.

This is why I haven't enjoyed using computers in years. Multiple things could be the problem--the distro, the burning program, the drive, the disc, the data cable...--and if it's any of the software, that becomes even more complicated because who knows what caused that--a corrupted installation (and if so, was it during installation or later) or a bad installation CD (presumably because of problems with this optical drive). Tracing the problem (if indeed there's only one thing wrong) either is impossible or requires considerable time and effort.

That's the worst advice I have ever seen or heard in my life!

The cleaning CDs and some compressed air are only a few $, if something needs cleaning you clean it, you don't throw it away. Cleaning is part of proper maintenance.

Do you throw your clothes away everyday? Do you buy a new car when you need an oil change?

That's a bit aggressive (and the price difference makes comparing an optical drive to a car unreasonable), but being frugal, yes, I would rather try to fix it before throwing it out.

Yes and the hint is in my opinion buying a computer is also a matter of luck .
Twelve years old OK , but how many burning hours

That's a point: I think it sat on a shelf for a few years before I pulled it out of a dead or abandoned computer.

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If you fail to see the downside in paying for something that might or might not work for an ultra cheap device that is supposed to work a 100%, feel free to do so.

[MODERATED]

Pathetic? Stupid people list? I'm sorry he/she annoyed you with his/her very overbearing expression of disagreement, but it bashed only your statement, not you.

I never made any statement.

...and yes I would always buy a new one if it's cheaper.

Sorry, I must have been unclear. "Your statement" refers to your advice which you just quoted. He/she overbearingly called your advice "worst advice I've ever heard in my life." What he said was too strident (noobish?), but since it didn't contain any personal attacks toward you, I think you overreacted.

Sure. I did overreact (just one of those days...).

Yet, I still think it's unacceptable to twist someone's words in such an extreme direction (even if it's about a 0.9 Euro device and a much more expensive "cleaning-cd").

It's true, I have used cleaning CDs in the past and they don't seem to work for me. All you want to do is eliminate the possibility that the lens is dirty, and thus save some money. The chances of the lens being dirty depend on what kind of drive it is and what you put in it. Open drives are more likely to get the lens dirty. Putting in dirty CDs doesn't help.

Completely unwarranted and "just one of those days" is not a valid excuse.
Please do not do that again.

Personally, I try only to use optical disks for media that I'll rip to hard drive (Audio CDs and movie DVDs) and for installation, backup and moving data use USB drives. That's because I lose track of the times I've burned a CD or DVD only to find that, even though the burning software said it went fine, there is a problem with it.
When I built my last PC I deliberately bought a moderately cheap USB optical drive that was on sale so that when it starts to show signs of failure I can replace it easily -- it also works with my netbook, which is handy.
Whilst buying a new drive may seem a little drastic if it's 5 years old and very unreliable then provided you can afford it it may be real answer. If you have some "air duster" though or an alcohol cleaning fluid and a swab to run over the lens then there's nothing wrong with giving it a go.

I understand completely, because I've had the same damned problem for months: my distros displaying strange errors ranging from the minor and subtle (commands in my everyday applications inexplicably not working as expected) to the glaring (system unable to boot and/or shut down properly). It's made me interested in net installing (just to eliminate the problem of bad optical discs or drives), but as far as I know, net installing is still not as easy as optical disc installation and isn't available for every distro.

I install from USB -- either dding the .iso directly or using unetboot. I have used net boot in the past but I haven't managed to find any distros offering it recently, not that I've looked that hard but they don't seem common any more.

Are you familiar with PXE boot?

I thought you needed a bootp server for PXE boot? What I recall was a CD that asked for an IP address on boot and downloaded the installer then booted into it. Or was there some ways of giving a URL to the net boot directly in the BIOS?
I wish I could recall exactly what they were.

Indeed.

The whole point of using PXE is not needing CD/DVD/... at all.

Example:
http://wiki.debian.org/PXEBootInstall

I would use it but I'm not about to leave my PC running 24/7 as a DHCP server and messing with router config and bringing up a virtual DHCP/PXE server is a lot more hassle than using a USB to net boot.
I can see that PXE would be great for a corporate network though, especially with a custom image.

True, PXE is still difficult to use.

No. What is it? From the above, I gather it's a relatively complicated network booting process requiring more effort than I probably want to give.

It allows you to install from a local network with nothing more than a PXE compatible network card (which is most of them). It's related to how dumb terminals boot but boots to an installer instead.