R40e DVD/RW Combi Upgrade

[Pookster]

Hi Guys,

I was wondering if somone could give me some advice, I am considering upgrading my thinkpads optical DVD drive to a DVD/CD-RW combi. I am aware that the drive is in a cradel on my current system which can be removed from the factory installed drive. However, I am also aware that the bezel on the front of the drive has a notch cut out of it.

I have looked around at some OEM solutions and have found 2 drives, an NEC and a Sony unit for around £50/$90. I was wondering if the bezels on all laptop drives are universal and I can remove the bezel from my current drive and just add it to the new one. Or if anyboy knows where I can source a drive for around the same price that isn't supplied by IBM, as I dont want to fork out about £200/$300.


Afterall my thinkpads 3 years old and it would be cheaper to just replace it if that were the case.

So please advise, as I really need a solution, I have tried external but have had lots of problems with USB based drives.

Many thanks for your time.

Warren

[schen]

Virtually all bezel are proprietary to the manufacturer. Different model from the same company might fit, but rarely if ever of different companies. Of course, there are actually just a few true manufacturing companies so you'll have to do some research. Cutting the notch is not a big deal though. Both my wife's A30 and my T23 use NEC ND series DVD burners that have had the notch cut out; I didn't find it to be very difficult at all.

[pjm99au]

You should be able to find a thinkpad ultrabay 2000 combi drive on ebay for the price you are looking at. With the cradle removed from the drive it is a bit of an exercise to unscrew and screw the new drive in (but fairly straight forward with the hardware manual). I don't think the ultrabay enhanced drive will work or the ultrabay slim as the connectors are in different locations