Check in System Profiler. ( apple logo / about this mac / more info ) under disk burning on the left hand pane. Check to see if it really is a Superdrive and also check which formats the drive can burn / read . It might be that it won't read for example DVD-RW discs and those are the only ones you have available.

Well, the voltage your iPhone receives can vary by the device you use to power it. So if I'm right in saying that the iPhone gauges wether the battery is full or not depending on the amount of time it spends connected to the supply. Your iHome could supplying less voltage to your iPhone than say the standard usb connector. So it could mess with the figures and the battery life. ( technical language again, apologies ) The iPhone could be displaying a full charge where the battery is only half full. A good test, make sure you have the battery percentage option turned on in the settings of the iPhone. Do a full charge from your iHome. Restart the iPhone and see what percentage shows up.

I would try and do a permissions repair for a start. ( utilities / disk utility ) then reboot . If that fails it could be a corrupted language in the system. Try reselecting English as the primary language. Reboot the system and see what Finder does. If Finder returns to normal It's a corrupt language and I would suggest reinstalling the OS. This should then solve the issue

Well on my white MacBook, I've been using the thin sheet of perforated material that the laptop shipped with. If that doesn't work out for you, I would try one of the many third part alternatives such as http://www.radtech.us/Products/NotebookS... Hope that helps