The eject button is linked by the same ribbon to the main board. Eject is NOT linked to the eject button on the actual drive, eject is an input to the main board which then under software control will send an eject command to the drive over IDE.

Possibly, in that case, the IDE ribbon is partly disconnected or even the PSU is dead. The HDD/CDROM power supplies come from the main board - again, check connectors.

Hugo