Replacing broken DVD drive in 360

[MikeRox]

Hi guys, my nephews 360's DVD drive packed in the other week and the system is well and truly out of warranty. He's come up this week and I have a RROD 360 which hasn't seen that much action so the DVD drive should be fine. I thought (like in the olden days) that it'd be a simple matter of ripping both consoles open and switching the drives over.

However I've been reading about needing to dump the original drives firmware and loading onto the new(er) drive and other oo er missus stuff. I thought it'd be a fairly quick job, but I'm guessing obviously not.

Anyone got any suggestions on switching the DVD drives, is there a decent guide anywhere? Neither system is modified in any way, shape or form and it is purely for the purpose of reading games and DVD movies again.

[smouty]

If they are the same type of drive it might be possible just to swap the lasers over az this is often the problem.

[MonkeyJuggleDX]

If I got hold of a dead 360 and the drive was the same as the one in my flashed system, could I just swap them over? Obviously, a flashed 360 is harder to shift than a standard one.

[RetroRevival]

The drives are linked to the motherboards in 360's via a special "key" meaning you would have to flash the old key to the new drive (assuming it is the same make of drive). The easiest thing to do would be to replace the laser. They are cheap enough and its a pretty easy job if you are confident with a screw driver and taking out / replacing ribbon cables.