I removed both screws holding the optical drive in place, but when I gently tried to wiggle the optical drive out, the bezel broke off. I think it broke the clip off one side of the bezel. I can put it back on but it's not strong enough to use to pull out the drive. I've removed drives before and they've always come out very easily. But this drive will not budge. There were only 2 screws holding it in and it's a new 2018 computer. (I'm outside the US so returning it is prohibitively expensive. My best option is to just order a new fan and replace it myself.)

Can anyone offer any advice on how to get the optical drive out so I can open it up to get to the fan?

Thanks.

I followed the instructions on page 33, but my issue is that with this laptop, the optical drive will not slide out. I've removed the screw pictured in the manual and there is a second screw right next to the drive that I've also removed - so nothing should be holding the drive onto the lapatop. I've removed the optical drive from other laptops and they've always slid right out - but with this one it's stuck tightly inside the laptop. When I tried to wiggle the bezel (which is all you can hold onto to pull out the drive), the bezel detached from the drive - and in the process, I think it broke the clip on one side. So now I can loosely reconnect the bezel to the drive on one side - but it's not strong enough to pull the drive out. I've turned the laptop on its side hoping gravity would help it slide out - but it does not budge. And with the bezel off, I can find anything on the drive itself to get a grip on so that I can slide out the drive. Of course I can't get inside the laptop either (to see what else might be holding it in place) because I need to remove the optical drive before it can be opened up. I've searched online for this problem - but I can't find anyone who's ever had this same problem.

Any suggestions? Thanks so much.

⟐ Answer accepted September 30, 2018 at 20:38 MST

After some experimentation I noticed a pattern: Every time I warm-booted the computer it would hang. I could only get it to fully start when it cold boots. This even holds true for the BIOS; if I boot into BIOS, then save and exit, the computer hangs. I have to power down and cold boot to get things running again.

Samsung Magician says the drive is on the latest firmware. Ideas?

⟐ Answered December 05, 2018 at 6:54 MST

⟐ Answered July 07, 2018 at 4:28 MST

Regards Roger.

⟐ Comment deleted October 09, 2019 at 21:55 MST

⟐ Commented September 12, 2019 at 17:25 MST

⟐ Commented August 16, 2019 at 13:09 MST