CDR/RW's are the Premiere Removable Storage Device
Jun 01 '01
The Bottom Line CDR/RWs are getting cheaper every day. Their speeds are also doubling. Now is the perfect time to pick up a drive for yourself.
CD Writers have revolutionized over the past couple of years. They went from being considers luxuries at $2000 or greater for drives to prices as low as under $100.
Now is the time to buy a CD writer. They are definitely the no. 1 choice of the removable storage options available. In my editorial, I will give you all the information I know and hopefully assist you in your purchase.
Why CDR/RW?
Out of all the removable media options available, CDs are the most efficient and cost effective options available on the market. CDs are small, and can be easily stored. Most CDs hold 650-700 megabytes of data, equaling to 74-80 minutes of CD Audio. Cdrom drives are located in most computers today. Most homes and cars have cd players making it the best choice to also store your music.
If you consider the other options out there, CD writers are the best option. Although DVDRs are on the horizon, they are too expensive and it will take atleast a year or two for prices to become reasonable for home users. CDRW’s can replace zip drives because they are smaller and hold more data. CDs also have good shell lives, spanning from 50 to 200 years.
Which brand should I choose?
Choosing the right brand can definitely improve your “ burning “ experience. The brands I recommend cost only $10-20 more than their cheaper counterparts but you will be happy when you have extended driver support and solid performance.
The two best brands, in my opinion and in my experience are TDK and Plextor. Plextor has been known as the CD burner speed king for many years with their SCSI versions, but their EIDE versions are absolutely outstanding. TDK’s Velocd line is very astounding, with good drive performance and excellent software bundles. TDK has better software bundles than Plextor but Plextor’s drives run slightly faster than TDK’s. But they are basically the same, and either one you choose will provide you with fantastic results.
I have had mixed experiences with HP. Although they sell some of the cheapest drives, their software bundles and drive performance leave a lot to be desired. I also tested a couple of Yamaha drives. Their drives are very solid but they fail to include good software. Sony suffers from the same problems too. Their drives are very dependable but their included Hotburn software is awful.
Brands I have yet to test are Creative Labs, which I heard have good software and support but their drives run slightly slower and Phillips, which has had many problems with faulty drives but their recent models are decent. I have not heard any feedback on Iomega, Ricoh, Pioneer, Acer or QPS drives.
Eide or Scsi?
Long time ago, SCSI was king. Being faster and more dependable than their Eide counterparts, SCSI was the premiere choice for CD burners. But in recent times, Eide has been closing the gap. SCSI is still faster than even the fastest Eide (SCSI, I should mention, comes in different versions, like SCSI 2, e.t.c., they are about 6 different types available)
With today’s fast Eide, Ultra ATA-100, you won’t see much of a difference in burning performance between the same rated Scsi drive. But the difference in price is much greater. Also, all motherboards come with about four Eide ports while SCSI ports are mostly acquired by buying adapter cards. There are motherboards with SCSI ports on them but these are not very popular in home desktops.
The biggest difference you will notice between these two technologies is SCSI doesn’t buffer out because of it doesn’t use cpu cycles in its burning process like Eide does. But Burn Proof technology, I’ll explain later, prevents this from happening in Eide.
There is no reason, unless you have spare SCSI ports lying around, to get a SCSI because Eide is cheaper, just as fast and almost as reliable as SCSI.
Speed
The faster the speed, the quicker it will finish. Basically, Speed is limited only by the depth of your pocket. For those who don’t know, the first rating is usually the CDR speed, that is one write cd burns. The second rating is usually the CDRW rating, CD Rewriteable unless there are only two ratings and this rating is therefore the Cdrom read speed, which is the third rating in CDR/RW drive. Fourth ratings, less frequent though, are usually the DVD read speed if the Drive is capable of doing so.
At this date, there are burners with CDR speeds at over 30x and CDRW speeds at over 20x. But, in most computer stores, you will see 16x/10x/40x as the fastest. A TDK/Plextor version of this speed drive runs at just over $200. At this speed, CDRs burn at under 6 seconds and CDRW burns take a bit longer. But, yesterday’s technology isn’t bad either. A 12x/8x/32x drive is still fast and runs for under 170 bucks. These drives, atleast the TDK and Plextor versions also come with the burn-proof technology which is in the 16x/10x/40x version.
If you still don’t want to shell out that much cash, 8x/4x/24x drives sell for just over $100 bucks. These drives don’t come with burn-proof technology but once you don’t use the computer while burning, things should work great. There are even cheaper options, like 4x/4x/24x drives which sell for $60. Unbuffered burns take about 15 minutes at this speed but you are paying $170 less for about a 10 minute longer wait.
Software
The software bundles for most drives should satisfy your basic need. But if you are looking for the best of the best, my pick would be Adaptec’s Easy CD Creator PRO. This has excellent audio ripping capabilities, burns fast and includes many features. Another good piece of software is Neo Burning Rom which is extremely good for burning games and cds that have copy protection on them.
It all about the Media
You can buy the best quality drive but if you use bad media, you end up with many a coaster. There is no one good media out there, but there are good media for certain drives. The best media for your drive is normally what the manufacturer bundles with it. Also, media information is also listen on their website.
For example, Plextor recommends Taiju Yeden as the preferred media for their drives. But Taiju Yeden is the manufacturer which many companies buy from and print their names on it. Sony uses Taiju Yeden manufactured CDs so therefore, Sony CDRs are good for Plextor Drives.
Anything else?
I may not have explained the buffer properly. There is a limited amount of buffer space in drives, either 2 MB or 4 MB. Data is transferred from the source, to the buffer and then to the cd. Now, because Eide is dependant on the CPU to fill the buffer unlike SCSI whose own controller does this, if the CPU during the burning process, stops to do another task, the buffer can empty and there will be a gab on the cd. This spoils the cd.
Sanyo invented the Burn Proof technology which is licensed by manufacturers to put in the drives. Burn proof technology prevents buffer under-runs, exactly how, I’m not to sure. I believe it allows the CD to stop burning if the buffer empties and continues to write without leaving gaps in the CD. However it does it, it works beautifully and reduces Buffer Under-runs by atleast 75%.
Many drives come internally or externally. External drives can use SCSI, Eide or USB. USB would be the easiest to install but has the slowest speeds of the three. Eide External Drive usually need to have special bays in the case and can be a hassle to set up. SCSI is the most expensive but would be the fastest of the three.
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Epinions.com ID:
adamadi
|
|
Reviews written: 56
Trusted by: 25 members
About Me:
"The more people smoke herb, the more Babylon fall" Bob Marley
|
|
|
© 1999-2009 Shopping.com, Inc.