XA1 hangs at "Welcome" with disk inside

Was watching Jet Li's "Fearless" (a rental from Netflix), and at 17:30 the image and machine froze.

I held in the Power button until it turned off, then turned it back on, but it only gets as far as displaying "Welcome" on the front panel.

So I unplugged it for 20 minutes, plugged it back in, same issue.

Called Toshiba tech support, and after 35 minutes on hold, got a guy who told me to do what I had already done, then said it had to be sent for service.

So two questions:

-Anyone have any other suggestions to get this beast to boot properly?

-Is there a way to remove the disk manually if I can't the thing to boot up?

An update: Finally managed to get the disk out by holding the eject button while powering up, but the thing still just sits there at "Welcome". Also tried disconnecting the HDMI cable and then powering up - no difference.

Arggghhhhh!!!!!!

No joy doing that. Damn.

How can a bad DVD screw up the machine like this?

Anyone know what Toshiba's repair charge is (if it's flat rate)?

Is this worth fixing, or should I just get a new one for $200?