Some years ago slot-load CD and DVD drives were abound.  Plextor, Pioneer, Sony, Toshiba all made some models that lacked the tray.  Now if you try to find one you’re out of luck (except, perhaps, on eBay where you might still find a second hand slot-load drive).

So what happened? The slot-loaders clearly cannot be as fragile as the tray units – the trays are flimsy!  Especially laptop DVD-drive trays almost self-destruct on slightest breeze!  Perhaps there were issues with the alignment… but then a slot-load DVD-ROM drive that I have had in use from the early part of this decade is still working fine and I’ve never had any trouble with it.  Perhaps it’s difficult to make writers that are slot-load?  But there is still a place for read-only units.  Two of the three computers our kids use (each has their own) has currently a destroyed DVD-ROM drive. You guessed it, the tray’s been bent or ripped out.  If they were slot-load drives, perhaps some items would’ve been stuffed into them, but likely they would not have been destroyed.  Slot-load drives would also be perfect for laptops: no super-flimsy trays, just a slot where a disk would sleekly slide in.

Clearly it is possible to continue manufacturing reliable slot-load drives as, for example, the popular game-console Wii that was released less than two years ago, comes with a slot-load DVD-drive.  Wii drive reads both 4.7Gb and 9Gb DVD disks so clearly alignment can not be a major issue.

Manufacturers, please bring back the slot-load drives!