OSDev.org

The only problem with eject is that if there's reading errors and the drive is stuck, and the driver doesn't want to give up, then it's possible to get to the point where trying to unlock the drive with eject will simply hang the eject command too.

Furthermore, I find it rather annoying that, when using an automatic volume manager (such as gnome volume manager), the cdrom drive's eject button is pretty useless since the drive is mounted automatically on media insert (and the drive is locked), and it is ejected automatically when you unmount it.

In general I'd say it would be better to keep the drive unlocked, and only lock during write operations (=burning a cd).

cheers Joe