macminihelp

Is there any way to contact Apple by e-mail or a more specific mailing address than 1 Infinite Loop Plaza?

Is anyone here an actual Apple employee or Mac genius?

I have a late 2009 Mac Mini 3.1 running Snow Leopard 10.6.8. I rarely use it but the past few times I have, the fan or dvd drive runs very loudly and it is not recognizing the dvd drive and will not eject discs. I thought I had fixed the issue by installing a "combo" update. After installing this update, discs showed up in the drive and could be ejected and I believe it didn't run so loudly. When I turned it on again, it's back to its old ways, loud and not showing any drive whatsoever.

Should I reinstall the OS or attempt something else? Is there some easier way to reset it without losing all data?