Superdrive won't read or burn DVDs

A few days ago I tried backing up my iTunes by using the File- Back up to Discs. The first go round never really got started as I discovered I wasn't using the appropriate DVDs. ( They were 16X). I went out and got some new DVD-rs 1X-16X and tried again today. My machine asked me to insert a blank disc. I did. It did some work and told me it would take 5 DVDs and asked if I wanted to continue. I clicked to go on and it started to work. It took about an hour to go through the songs and then get to the burning part. Close to the end it spit the disc out. ( I wasn't there to see if it had finished the first disc, but the window at the top of iTunes was saying the disc wasn't blank. I assumed it had asked for the second disc to be inserted while I was out of the room.) I inserted a new DVD and the thing just kept saying it was checking the media. It then spit it back out. I tried several other DVDs and just kept getting the same message. I also went into preferences and slowed the burn speed. I had seen that suggested on this board as well.
After all this I decided to try to just burn a small iPhoto library to a DVD. That too didn't work. I would put in a blank disc, the drive would hum and then eject the thing- never putting a disc image on my desktop.
Finally, I decided to play a commercial DVD on the thing. The same thing happened. The drive hummed and then spit it out.
My superdrive is a PIONEER DVD-RW DVR-104. It will accept CDs but I have yet to find a single DVD that it will work.
Any ideas as to what might be wrong? We rarely use the drive. This machine is used mainly for the internet, to store our iTunes library, and as a backup location for iPhoto libraries. I can't remember the last time we burned a CD or DVD- it's been at least 6 months.
Does anyone have any troubleshooting things I might try?
Thanks in advance for your help!
Jenn

Jenn,
did you check if the drive is dirty inside? If so, I recommend to buy a bottle of compressed air and a cleaning cd (with little brushes) and try to get the dirt out. It took me an evenig with my SD and finally it worked again.
Regadrs,
Joerg

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