Help needed- ibm laptop combo drive not working

[shivkumar]

I have ibm laptop R40e whose combo drive is not working. Basically the read write head seems to have gone bad. I showed in a shop and they told that i need to buy a new drive. how much will a combo drive for my laptop cost? the shopkeeper told around 12k. is it so costly? where i can get genuine combo drive with genuine rate in kerala preferably cochin ?

[QwertyManiac]

I dont think a laptop rom will cost that much (12k ) Ask your IBM retailer, he may be able to provide you witha replacement. I feel that only the lens must have worn off and replacing that would solve the issue. But yeah, get the drive checked for specific errors and then opt to repair or purchase a new one...

[Sourabh]

Bad luck! Generally one can resort to external USB based optical drives for the laptop. But since your laptop doesnt support USB 2.0, you cant have the privileges to go for it too.

These UltraBay Combo drives for IBM, some Dell Latitude and Toshiba laptops can be very costly. You are just caught in a Catch-22 situation. Probably ask the dealer for some discounts or contact a IBM service center. Spending something like 7-8k can be wise, anything more than it is an over kill.

[shivkumar]

Can i not use any external optical disk thru usb? I was planning to buy one. my bios setup shows option of booting through usb port devices, whether it will not work that way?
Whether these UltraBay dvd rom drives are cheaper?
Help me!!!