You may remember the problems I had with the HDD of my Yamada DVR 9000 TV
recorder . I did get that sorted by FAT32′ing on Win98 m/c.

I haven’t been able to write R disks since last summer and RW’s screwed up
with more than 3 hours of data. Since Christmas I haven’t been able to write
any disks at all - a bit of a drag as I recorded lots at Christmas and the
HD is pretty full.

A simple swap of the DVD drive seemed the answer BUT - it’s a unlabeled
lite-on unit and a non standard size. I assumed the device was probably
running Linux and would need drivers for whatever DVD was installed so it
would need to be a like for like replacement.

However I found http://www.howtomendit.com/answers.php?id=142563 where
someone said a Sony dru190A would work as a replacement. Having sourced one
(Amazon after a few tries elsewhere)  I gave it a go with the box open & the drive laid on top of the existing one. A bit of a problem there as the cat (mad) stalks shiney DVD’s and kept trying to nose at the inards - not sure how anti-static a cats nose is, or what 240V would do to him - couldn’t make him any dafter anyway.

I wasn’t surprised when it didn’t seem to work but that was with the Philips
DVD+RW’s I had carefully sourced as another forum recommended these with the
Yamada. Somewhat amazingly it did work with the standard Tesco DVD+R’s I had
given up using.

Getting it working was one thing - putting the box back together was
another. The weird fixings relied on screwing the DVD to the bottom of the
case (on some risers) and slotting into some large tags on the front of the
box. Not a hope with the standard PC style Sony. However it shouldn’t get
chucked around much so I put blue tack on the risers, bent the tags flat &
gaffa taped it all in place and it seemed OK. I snapped mirrored the drawer
cover of the old unit and glued it to a chipboard spacer which I blue tacked
to the DVD drawer itself. A it of black tape to cover the chipboard and it
even looks pretty good.

As the unit only cost about £110, the replacement drive at £30 still means
it was a bargain  - though I have wished I’d spent more on the many
occasions it has played up! Chalk up another victory to the web.