Chosen Solution
How do you open up Bose Model AV3-2-1 Media Center to get to stuck optical drive? Update (01/27/2014) Thank you for the information, I will be able to disassemble till Tuesday, I will keep you updated, once again thank you for your time.
Hi Edwin, Under the system, there are 6 screws holding the top on. Unscrew all of them. Gently pull the top of the box off, you will see a small form factor motherboard under a tv capture card, next to the DVD drive. Remove the TV capture card and unplug it from the motherboard. Gently pull the front of the DVD case open to unseat it from the drive (this takes patience and a soft touch). Carefully remove the front panel of the Bose system by gently prying it apart. Lift up the DVD drive (its a 5 1/4" drive like is in your computer). On the front of the drive is a small pinhole. Take a paper clip and shove it in there. This will trigger the manual release for your DVD player. Take out the DVD and put it all back together. Hope this helps!
I fixed a Bose 321 system with a stuck DVD drawer. Once you open the case you will see that the DVD unit looks to be a standard DVD unit you would place into a computer and could likely be replaced with a cheap one from your computer store if you are unable to repair it. The root cause in my case was the small white gear attached to motor drive shaft. It had slid upwards so that it didn’t fully mesh with the mating gear and in addition it was blocking the opening of the drawer itself. That causes a problem in that you need to open the drawer about a half an inch at least in order to be able to snap off the front faceplate attached to the drawer. The faceplate has snaps on the bottom and slides upwards to remove. Once the drive drawer faceplate is removed, the drive itself can be removed from the unit and you can gain access to the drawer eject pin hole that is present on most (all??) computer type DVD/CD units. This small hole is present on the lower right hand side of the front of the unit. If you stick a straightened paper clip into this hole and push, it will cause the drawer to eject. I was able to do that to get the drawer open at which point I could see the small white gear on the motor drive shaft. I pushed the gear back onto the drive shaft properly and put a small dollop of epoxy on it to prevent it from moving again. After doing that the drawer opened and closed perfectly.
there should be a hole you on stick a paperclip into to open it. (example: https://www.google.com/search?q=small+ho…:)
