Here's what I think:

Reformat your hard drive. This means backing up all your data, erasing your hard drive, and reinstalling everything from square 1. Yes, it is a lot of work, but in the end, it will just like it did when you first started it up. I am not quite sure what is wrong with your optical drive, but this reformat may fix any driver problems relating to the drive. If the drive is physically broken, well too bad.

After reformatting your laptop, I would recommend your purchase a desktop. You could purchase one through a company like Dell, or can put one together yourself if you feel capable. In either case, I would be that the desktop will either be must more powerful than an equivalent laptop for the price, or will simply be cheaper.

When I started college two years ago, I wanted a laptop that was portable, and reasonably powerful. That way, I could take it to class, yet could still play games on it. In the end, I spent $1800 on a laptop. However, looking at options now, I wish I instead got a $3-500 netbook and spent the rest on a powerful desktop.


tl;dr: Think about your priorities (what you want), what you're willing to do/buy, and how much you are willing to spend.