In short I need a cheap external disc drive and dont want to cough up the 20$ and buy online so thrift store it is. I cant really come up with a way to test these usually usb powered drives besides somehow setting up a computer or asking the workers for help (doubt they will). Does anyone have an idea to narrow down if a drive is defective or should i just take a chance and hopefully the store has a return policy?
bring a laptop. if you want an external one, they most of the time only need usb and if not, probably a 12V power brick
Take in an already working laptop to test with.
The majority of thrift stores I’ve been to dont even allow to bring in bags so sadly dont think this will work in my case but I’ll still ask the staff when I go for future reference thank you
You can usually go in empty handed first and ask if it’s ok for you to bring in just your laptop to see if a usb drive works, and then go get it with minimal other stuff for them to be suspicious about.
Then when you try to leave they’ll tackle you for ‘stealing’ a laptop.
That’s one reason to talk to them and ask permission first, avoiding that kind of drama.
An Android phone/tablet with a USB adapter? If it shows up as some kind of HID, Android might pick it up…?
Never had any trouble bringing laptop into a shop before. They don’t want valuables left at the door to be stolen, people would blame them. Been to some pretty big second hand shops carrying a laptop and other stuff, never had an issue.
Most of them will let you take stuff back for a week, even if they’ll only give you a credit note back.
Theoretically, I think a USB optical drive works just like a flash drive or external hard drive.
So, maybe get an adapter for your smartphone that converts from female USB A to whatever USB port your phone has (either USB C or MicroUSB or… some Apple proprietary thing). Then bring a disk and your phone and the adapter, connect it all up, and see if it’ll read the drive. (Probably worth testing with a flash drive beforehand to make sure your phone/adapter work as expected.)
Alternatively, some external optical drives will have an aux out. If you bring an audio CD, you could just bring some headphones with a regular 3.5mm audio connector, pop the CD in, plug in the headphones, and see if you get audio.
For either one, you’ll probably need to connect the drive to a 110V power port. I think most external optical drives would require that. Some, I think, instead get their power from dual USB plugs, so you might have to bring a battery-powered charger with a USB port as well.
Of course, depending whether you already have any of these things lying around your house, it might be more expensive to buy all the stuff you’d need to prove the drive works before purchase than to just purchase two or three hoping one works. Also, the people working at the thrift store might not take kindly to what you’re hoping to do.
That’s… kindof the cost of purchasing things (particularly electronics) at thrift stores. There’s not necessarily a good way to determine if it works before purchase.
disc drives usually dont work on android unless they have a soecisl mode which “translates” the disc filesystem so it looks like FAT32 to the phones.
I’m not sure a phone would be able to power the CD drive
Didnt even think about using an adapter already have one so this might be worth a try
Ask to plug it into a working computer they’re selling.
You could try to plug them into a powerbank and put in a disk. See if it spins up normally. It is a bad sign if it repeatedly spins up or down.
I did not try if this works.
A disc you don’t need back. :)
Alrighty this might be plan B if the adapter idea doesnt work appreciate it
You can connect it to an android phone with an adapter.
