Yeah if you can RGH it then you can have a very nice thing from it. If it is not banned you might be able to get it to the point where you can play XBLA and games on demand (plus the other stuff a networked 360 might do). A jasper RGH modded 360 is a nice thing indeed.
If you have the keys (doubtful if it is as you say and the only way you will get them now is RGH and at that point you might as well just that instead) you could program a new drive, and even without that you could possibly put another drive in and use it as a DVD player. I am not sure what you would have fried on the DVD drive but probably not a simple fuse or resistor or something you can just solder a new one in for.