As well as cleaning the lense, what other troubleshooting methods are there for a malfunctioning laptop CD-ROM drive?
Could be a faulty laser, inside you might be able to find a dial to adjust the height of the read laser like there are inside PS2s.
That sounds complicated 
I splashed a load of CD cleaner liquid over the lense (not sure if that was wise or not 
) but it didn’t make much difference