Best CD Burner

[downhiller80]

IDE. What's the one to get?

- seb

 

[bacillus]

if absolute speed isn't everything for you then get the x32 liteon cdrw as it does perfect SD2 copies even of the latest version!

 

[ojai00]

Lite-On, LG, Teac are all good models if you're not looking to spend that much. Get a 16 or 24X because there's really no point in getting one faster. You'll just finish CDs a few seconds faster. Hope this helps.

 

[FrozenAthlon]

plextor is the ultimate burner... I currenlty own the 24x version but if you are a speed freak they just currently unleashed the 40x!

Frozen

 

[Ausm]

I put my vote in for Plextor also


Ausm

 

[Biggs]

I'd vote for the LG 24x, fast, reliable, quiet, and has an 8MB cache to boot.

 

[CraigRT]

<< I'd vote for the LG 24x, fast, reliable, quiet, and has an 8MB cache to boot. >>


And they are a great price...

I personally love Ricoh though, I haven't found a flaw in either of the drives I have used by Ricoh. thumbs up for them!
Much of the same for LG though too, I have a 16X -burn proof- at work and it works absolutely perfect.. couldn't ask for a better drive.. i don't think it's worth the money at all buying a plextor over the burners half the price when i have literally never witnessed any problems with the 3 burners i have personally owned/used..

 

[jcmkk]

Get a Lite-On 40x. You can get them for $130 now. You might as well get the fastest one since it is so cheap.

 

[camara120]

Does the 40x LiteOn do SD2?

 

[CraigRT]

<< Get a Lite-On 40x >>



Spare yourself and buy something that is quality.......

 

[tornadobox]

go Plextor if you can spend that much...if not, i'd go with the Lite-On.

 

[sd]

Someone other than Plextor makes burners?

 

[punkrawket]

you can get a Lite-On 32/12/40 for $99 from here

 

[AluminumStudios]

I just bought an LG 8160b (16x10x40) to replace my Yamaha 8x8x24 Ultra-SCSI that died 1 month out of warrenty:|

It burns a 700 meg CD in 5 minutes flat which is good enough for me and has buffer underrun protection so the 2 meg buffer doesn't bother me. It's read speeds are great - I use a utiltiy to verify CDs after I burn them and it rips through the CD on the read.

I paid $99 at Best Buy and am waiting for a $20 rebate. I considered a Plextor but I wanted to keep costs down and I read a lot of goodthings about LG on these forums.

Also, in this article tomshardware.com said it was an awesome overburner. It can fill an entire 99 mintue CD!

 

[punkrawket]

or for $103 shipped at newegg.com

 

[Eug]

Opinions I've gathered from the CDRW forums.

Lite-On 24X: Most versatile for game backup. Supposedly not as well built as Plextor or Teac.
Teac 24X: Best all around burner for the price. Best media compatibility and fastest seek times of the three. Game backup not as good as Plextor or Lite-On, but better than most burners.
Plextor 24X: One of the best all around burners, but $$$. Media compatibility not as good as Teac, and game backup not as good as Lite-on.

Beyond 24X, the speed increases are there, but not huge, and some have more problems with some media. (ie. 32X burn on 16X media is often not as reliable as 24X burn on 16 media, for obvious reasons.)

I can tell you the Plextor Windows firmware update app is suck however, at least for the 12X burner. Wouldn't update one burner I had a work, and hung during an update of my friend's burner, on a different computer. (Fortunately it didn't trash his firmware though.) Dunno about the update apps of other brands though. Might be equally bad. (Well the Yamaha one I tried worked great and showed what was happening, and never hung the few times I tried it. It was DOS based however.)

I went with the Teac CD-W524E. Review here

 

[peterskm]

I recently got a LiteOn 24x and this thing flies. Haven't had any problems yet and the price was good from newegg.com.

 

[Yossarian]

<< I can tell you the Plextor Windows firmware update app is suck however, at least for the 12X burner. Wouldn't update one burner I had a work, and hung during an update of my friend's burner, on a different computer. (Fortunately it didn't trash his firmware though.) Dunno about the update apps of other brands though. Might be equally bad. (Well the Yamaha one I tried worked great and showed what was happening, and never hung the few times I tried it. It was DOS based however.) >>



I had the exact same problem updating a 12x Plextor, you need to update your ASPI layer. I got a nice email from their tech support in about a day with links to the files. LMK if you need it.

But wait a minute, these posts don't even belong here. Don't you guys know this is the Anandtech Hard Drive forum??!!

 

[tornadobox]

hard drive forum?? try general hardware forum!

 

[Eug]

<< I had the exact same problem updating a 12x Plextor, you need to update your ASPI layer. I got a nice email from their tech support in about a day with links to the files. LMK if you need it. >>

Hmmm... Strange. Do they have their own ASPI version? If so does it screw around with the burning software? If it matters any, the failed update was with Win 2000, and the hung update was with Win XP. Anyways, a link would be appreciated thx.

 

[Yossarian]

Ok I'll post when I get home from work.

Tornadobox, that was kind of a joke since every other thread is about somebody's IBM HD dying....

 

[tornadobox]

PipBoy, my bad, guess that one flew over my head

 

[Salvador]

<< Spare yourself and buy something that is quality....... >>



First of all, there is nothing wrong with the LiteOn. It works flawlessly for me and it's fast! The great thing about it is that I paid about $70 for it with tax. I bought a HP 8x a year ago and it cost $200. That's before I learned about the computer forums and where to find a deal.

Anyway.. My point here is that the Plextor's are nice, but you're not buying a car here. You'll probably spend under $100 on a burner these days and have it a year if you're lucky considering the way the technology is moving on drives these days.

My friend has a Plextor 12x SCSI that he bought 2 years ago for over $300 to run with a slower machine. This was before burn proof technology and IDE's were a nightmare on older machines with buffer underruns. Anyway.. It's a nice drive, but I don't think I'd trade it for my LiteOn 24x burner. I love being able to burn discs in under 4 minutes that take him at least 8.

You know.. Since I'm about to buy a black case, I thought about selling my one month old LiteOn burner and replacing it with a black version. I would probably have to take a hit on my drive and then spend a premium for the black drive. I thought about it and decided against it because by the time I sell my drive and get a black 24x drive, I'll probably be a few months away from buying a faster drive anyway. Considering that Dell only sells black cases and black drives now, I can see the market switching over in a hurry, so beige drives will be about as rare next year as black drives are now.

Sal

 

[Eug]

<<

<< Spare yourself and buy something that is quality....... >>



First of all, there is nothing wrong with the LiteOn. It works flawlessly for me and it's fast! The great thing about it is that I paid about $70 for it with tax. I bought a HP 8x a year ago and it cost $200. That's before I learned about the computer forums and where to find a deal.

Anyway.. My point here is that the Plextor's are nice, but you're not buying a car here. You'll probably spend under $100 on a burner these days and have it a year if you're lucky considering the way the technology is moving on drives these days.

My friend has a Plextor 12x SCSI that he bought 2 years ago for over $300 to run with a slower machine. This was before burn proof technology and IDE's were a nightmare on older machines with buffer underruns. Anyway.. It's a nice drive, but I don't think I'd trade it for my LiteOn 24x burner. I love being able to burn discs in under 4 minutes that take him at least 8.

You know.. Since I'm about to buy a black case, I thought about selling my one month old LiteOn burner and replacing it with a black version. I would probably have to take a hit on my drive and then spend a premium for the black drive. I thought about it and decided against it because by the time I sell my drive and get a black 24x drive, I'll probably be a few months away from buying a faster drive anyway. Considering that Dell only sells black cases and black drives now, I can see the market switching over in a hurry, so beige drives will be about as rare next year as black drives are now.

Sal >>


I agree that the Lite-On is a pretty good burner, but from what I've read the build quailty isn't as good as others, and the write quality isn't top end either. See below. OTOH, it's probably the best burner for backing up games. I see your point, but when other good drives are available (not necessarily Plextor) for only $10 more, the draw of the Lite-On isn't as strong, unless you only want it for games.

 

[WyteWatt]

Plextor. They are not very expersive now a days. Plextor 24x 10x 40x is not that much at all. Very good firmware. Easy to update. And at least you have very good firmware support.