Why does my CD rom open up in one shot no delay, no resistance, no complication when I have a disk in it? However when I do not have a disk in it, I hit the button, the drive spins, and the internal slider just goes, "kachunk-kachunk" . Then it is a fine art of repeatingly tapping the eject button, trying to catch the right sequence of slide attempts to push the door open.

it is literally 100% accurate with CD in the drive, 100% inaccurate with CD not in the drive.