Original URL: https://www.theregister.com/2008/01/17/slot_load_pc_pro_drive_mayhem/

'EcoDisc' allegedly trashes man's optical disc drive

Maybe he should have read the warning label

By Tony Smith

Posted in Personal Tech, 17th January 2008 18:06 GMT

UK magazine PC Pro today told the world how one of its readers didn't read the warning label on a free cover-mount disc and as a result got it stuck in his computer, allegedly damaging the machine's optical drive.

Last weekend, the UK's Mail on Sunday newspaper gave away a free DVD of Neil Diamond's movie, The Jazz Singer. Written clearly on the back of the package: "No Apple slot in drive [sic]" with a big red cross over the drive's icon.

OK, so that's not exactly well-constructed English, but the meaning is clear enough: don't put this disc in a Mac.

PC Pro's reader did so anyway, and slipped the disc into his machine "before realising the implications". Now "the disc drive no longer works".

He admitted: "I have booked the computer in for repairs and it is likely to cost £60 plus VAT to repair."

Ouch.

The DVD was not a standard product but a so-called 'EcoDisc'. This medium is 50 per cent thinner than a regular DVD, and is both recyclable and biodegradable. It has almost half the production and transport carbon footprint of a standard DVD.

One EcoDisc supplier, Breed Media, admits it only has a "98 per cent" playability, according to the company's website.

The reader claimed other users had been hit too. For its part, the Mail on Sunday told Pro that it had had only "a couple of people phoning up, but nothing major" after shipping the disc. EcoDisc devoloper, ODS, which specialises in magazine cover-mount discs, said it had had only "dozens" of complaints out of its production of "over ten million of these discs", PC Pro reports.

It's not known how many of these complaints came from other Mac users, or from owners of other machines with slot-load drives, like the PS3.