What CD-RW do u recommend?

[HawkBoy 0]

What CD-RW do u guys recommend? I want to be able to burn everything (music/data/vcd/. . .)

 

PC specs:

Athlon 550, AMD 550, 256 MB ram, crappy motherboard (though it will be replaced soon enough), . . .

 

I remember a time when most burners would create problems (writing, reading, installing, . . .). I've noticed that most of that is gone. Is there anything I should watch out for?

 

Thnx in advance

Hope you don't think this is a bad question =)

[adamvjackson 0]

TDK and Yamaha seem to make the best overall drives, IMO. If price is an issue, I'd get a Lite-On drive, also good quality, but they can be hard to find, as they rarely sell under the brand Lite-On, usually something a bit more generic, such as BusLink.

[sapiens74 0]

http://direct.mwave.com/mwave/DeptMM-REw.hmx?UID=&CID=&Back=

 

has lite-on for good prices

[Christianb 8]

I'm not going to endorse anybody's anything, but I just wanted to say that best buy has a hell of a deal going on:

Best Buy has got the Digital Research 40/12/48X CD-RW drive for only $29.99 with free shipping after a $30 Mfr. rebate. Click here for the techdeal and search for 'Digital Research'.

 

OK one quickie, Plextor Drives are pretty shweet they come with a bit by bit cd copier that can't be tricked by funny file systems.

[Linuxboy00 0]

Just my opinion.. I prefere Plextor drives myself.

I have a Plexwriter 16x10x40 drive and it has never let me down.

Even with two firmware updates.. Still going strong.

[BladeRunner 0]

Of course I have to recommend the unit I use

TEAC CD-W540E

 

40x/12x/48x IDE with 8MB buffer, BURNProof, Mount Rainier

 

Lovely piece of kit, never had a single problem with it and not too pricey either.

[Immortal 0]

It really depends on what u want it for?

here is a list of CD-RW's and what they are good for:

Audio = Any Plextors over 16x and new Yamahas *NOT LITE-ON*, Plextors can also beat the Key2Audio protection by Sony, and so can the newer yamahas, sony drives over 40x wite speed can aswell.

 

Games/with protections= Lite-Ons over 16x (Write speed) mainly, but if you have an Asus,Plextor... with it it will make a good combo. This is becuase Lite_ons arent good with Sub-Channel (some new Sony protections that use it eg. Securom)

 

Data= really any CD-RW is good for this.

 

Make sure it has a buffer of 2MB or over, Justlink or any other buffer underrun protection and burnproofing.

[Mr.Guvernment 0]

Plextor - i burn ALOT f cd's, - i make ALOT of copies (copy procted cd's everything)

 

i got the 24x , and it has not let me down at all! (will be gett'n the 40x with enw work computer)

 

 

Yamaha - i went through 3 10x yamaha's in 1 week last year - they would just suddenly stop working - but i have a friend who has had one for over a year with no problems.

 

 

P.S - Linuxboy00 - want to maybe put your system specs side by side, or use the [size code on your sig? be aprpeciated

[pmistry 0]

LG, they are cheap and get the job done quite well. If you need information on CD-RW drives this is an excellent site to get such information http://www.cdrlabs.com/

 

I have an LG 32x/10x/40x and it is quiet, fast, compatible with tons of media and will read anything I throw at it, the 8 MB buffer is good too.

[appzattak 0]

I would say Lite-On is prolly over all the best, specially if you are concerned about being able to back up sd2 protected games, these burners will burn all protection flawlessly.....I also have a tdk which is awesome but wont record sd2....fyi liteon also sells under the name Cendyne...

[Azreal 0]

For Data/Games Lite-On CDRW RULE but they do suck at audio. I have a 40x12x48 I converted it to the 48x12x48 and it's great had a 12x10x32 before that. I think there pretty sold drives. So like every is suggesting it's really what you want to do with it.

[el_vago32 0]

i got a friend who has from almost 4 years a cd-burner, an hp like...8x and he has a MEGA TOWER of copied cd's with about 400 cd's, but those only are the ones which stay alive, heehe, and all those cd's he's recorded is with wih that burner, so i can say HP RULZZZ!!

[Mr.Guvernment 0]

RICO Rules - 400 cd's - nothing - well heck to some 10,000 is nothing i guess

 

my RICO 4x i used in my old work to burn ISP cd's - i did well over 1000+ in the span of a few months - not to mention the 500 + blanks i have - as well as how many other copies i burned for friends

 

i know that amount is not to much - but i still have that drive and it will copy anything - read anything!! i lvoe my old Rico!

 

HP the earlier models i did not like, my uncle had 2 of them and they had alot of problems reading burned cd's i made.

[Davros 0]

I have a Yamaha 16x that I hate! It's noisy, and has a really long spin up time, and chokes my cpu to death when writing leadin/leadout.

 

I got a Plextor 40x that I love! Very fast, very quiet, and no problems doing other things while burning. Make sure you're HDD isn't too old so you can burn at 40x.

[HawkBoy 0]

Wow, thanks for all the replies.

During this time, I've been doing some research (that's an understatement, hehe). No one has said anything bad about lite-on (I haven't seen anything bad about copying audio). I have found some disappointing reviews of the older plextore drives (24/10/40) and asus has come off quite well.

Unfortunately, I can't find many good reviews (aimed at someone other than the average computer newbie) that are recent.

Could you please tell me if you know any good review sites?

NOTE

I have already checked Tom's hardware (nice), CNET (not deep enough), ZDNet (same as CNET), and PCWorld(same as CNET and ZDNet).

[clutch 1]

I love my Plextor 40x24x40 drives (I have one at home and at work). Great units. Yamaha makes some nice stuff too.

[Edguy 0]

Recomended: NEC 9100A... 40/10/40... fast.. reliable... with...Justlink

 

from my experiences, i'd stay clear of Samsung and LG, 2 friends of mine has gone through quite alot of those.... they changed them for TDK and Plextor.. resp... and no problems so far.

[sapiens74 0]

I'm going to order the Lite ON 40x black

 

Like 56 Bucks

[Brian Frank 0]

I bought a Lite-On 40x burner a while back. I don't do a lot of burning, but it's still very fast and makes short work of what I need to burn.

[Yearout 0]

Well I'll put my 2 cents in, I love the TDK. Never ever had a problem burning anything.

[CUViper 0]

I usually like TDK as well, but I would like to throw out a warning - their newer drives (48x and 40x) are not nearly as good as the old ones. My roommate bought a 48x, and about every third disc he burned was bad. Also, my 12x TDK was ripping cd audio literally five times faster.

 

It's no wonder then that you can find the TDK 40x and 48x drives for around $100, yet the 32x still costs $150...

[adamvjackson 0]

You know, the cdrw drive is the oldest equipment in my pc, A Ricoh drive running at 12x... Guess it's time soon for an upgrade. This drive's been great though.

[Yearout 0]

Quote:

I usually like TDK as well, but I would like to throw out a warning - their newer drives (48x and 40x) are not nearly as good as the old ones. My roommate bought a 48x, and about every third disc he burned was bad. Also, my 12x TDK was ripping cd audio literally five times faster.

It's no wonder then that you can find the TDK 40x and 48x drives for around $100, yet the 32x still costs $150...

lol I should have put that in there that mine is 16x....
Thanks I will remember what you said about there newest ones..

[DosFreak 2]

Plextor 16x->24x->40x->Liteon 40x->48x.

 

'Nuff said.

 

[Christianb 8]

Although I haven't ever used it and can't comment on it's quality Yamaha has a 40X burner that'll print labels on the tops of CDs too. That looks awesome.

Check it out: Shweet Drive (You'll need flash www.Macromedia.com)

-Christian