Is there a faster than average DVD reader?

[shortylickens]

My dvd burner died and while Steam has been taking pretty good care of me theres the occasional older game I like to play which requires a disc. Also some utility apps. And I still have a decent collection of movies which cannot be found on Netflix or their version looks like ass.

It needs to be SATA and I would like if it were a standard one slot body but if you know of one thats slim line or double sized I could make it fit. Plenty of room in the case.
If you know of a really fast reader without writing I could just throw in a basic burner as well, those can be had dirt cheap on Amazon.

Actually, I'd be willing to settle for a USB or eSATA reader if thats all you can suggest. I can boot from USB so having to reinstall Windows that way would not be an issue.

 

[exdeath]

What's a DVD?

Thing to do is just rip all your obsolete media to ISO's on a USB 3.0 thumb drive using a laptop or something. Most people here don't even use the 5.25" bays anymore.

 

[groberts101]

LOL.. now we hate all former media that doesn't R/W as fast as SSD?

A machine without a DVD player could hardly be called a PC even in this day and age. We call those.. "netbooks" and "tablets".

Also pretty tough to find a case of USB drives for the same price as a case of DVD's.

 

[Coup27]

Most people here don't even use the 5.25" bays anymore.

A wild and ludicrous assumption.

I use my optical drive and would not build a PC without one.

And in your world, how do you rip your purchased software/game to an ISO if you haven't installed one?

 

[groberts101]

And in your world, how do you rip your purchased software/game to DVD if you haven't installed one?

ooh ooh.. lem'me guess this one!

HE DOWNLOADS THEM OFF THE INTERNET AT SUPER-DUPER FAST SPEEDS?

sorry exdeath.. just fartin' around. We see your avatar and by now we know how fast you like to go these days. lol

 

[Coup27]

haha

 

[Diogenes2]

To answer the OP..
The best DVD burners appear to be 24x, and some of the cheapest appear to be 24x also ...

Find one you like at a price you can afford..

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=100007589%20600003509%20600003707&IsNodeId=1&bop=And&Order=PRICE&PageSize=20

As little as $16 shipped..

 

[shortylickens]

I know where I can find cheap generic ones. I wasnt asking for that. I tried looking around the interwebs for faster than average DVD readers. Couldnt find what I needed so I hoped the great nerd society of Anandtech would know something not commonly discussed.

YOU MEN FAILED!



The only reason I ask is cuz I remember back in the day Kenwood had their TrueX CD line with 7 beams that could read at 100x. Was wondering if anyone did something similar for DVD readers. Obviously not, either that or you guys arent as brainy as you think you are.

I guess I will have to go with a cheap ass piece of junk from Amazon. Its not easy to find above average quality these days either.

 

[exdeath]

A wild and ludicrous assumption.

I use my optical drive and would not build a PC without one.

And in your world, how do you rip your purchased software/game to an ISO if you haven't installed one?

Laptop.

 

[exdeath]

LOL.. now we hate all former media that doesn't R/W as fast as SSD?

A machine without a DVD player could hardly be called a PC even in this day and age. We call those.. "netbooks" and "tablets".

Also pretty tough to find a case of USB drives for the same price as a case of DVD's.

Don't need a case when you can put a dozen DVDs on a thumb drive. Even an external 2.5" 7200 RPM drive is better. Can copy 5 GB to my Patriot Supersonic faster than a DVD drive can finish the lead in track.

Mechanical media does not and will not touch my main except for USB 3/eSATA HDD for backup only.

Didnt mean to go off topic, just thought about the recent poll where most said they haven't had or used an optical drive in years.

 

[exdeath]

I guess I will have to go with a cheap ass piece of junk from Amazon. Its not easy to find above average quality these days either.

They are all expendable, nobody really cares about quality anymore when it comes to optical. Cheap enough to to throw away and replace = easy money for manufacturers.

 

[wpcoe]

And in your world, how do you rip your purchased software/game to an ISO if you haven't installed one?

Laptop.

Your laptop has a DVD drive? How quaint. :biggrin:

 

[lamedude]

Newegg has a 24x burners that read at 16x (WTF?) or 18x ROM drives. I doubt you'll notice the extra upto ~3MBps speed.

 

[Cerb]

I guess I will have to go with a cheap ass piece of junk from Amazon. Its not easy to find above average quality these days either.

Get one that you can flash modded firmware to. Top quality does not exist, anymore, for these drives. You can get worse, but you can't get great.

 

[Coup27]

Laptop.

So you buy some software (example MS Office) which comes on a DVD. You then fire up your laptop and rip the DVD to an ISO on your laptop with their mega fast DVD drives. You then copy that ISO to your thumbdrive and then either copy it back to the original PC, or mount it on the thumbdrive just so you can install it?

I'm not disagreeing with you that electronic media isn't a lot faster overall, but an optical drive offers a level of convenience and flexibility for many tasks which I am nowhere near ready to give up.

To the original topic, I think DVD drivers are such a commodity item these days that its unlikely anybody will have any specific recommendations for you. I had 3 TSST drives which were blazing fast at ripping my album collection into mp3 format but all three suffered a premature failure. I got my supplier to send me a Sony Optiarc drive instead which was noticeably slower, but has never missed a beat.

My advice would be to stick with either Sony or Samsung and just get one with the highest speeds.

 

[Soundmanred]

The only reason I ask is cuz I remember back in the day Kenwood had their TrueX CD line with 7 beams that could read at 100x.

That was never tried with DVD drives because it really didn't work well when Kenwood did it with CDs.
What a complete failure of a product, but kudos for trying!

 

[Diogenes2]

I know where I can find cheap generic ones. I wasnt asking for that.....

Then you should have made that clear in you OP..

Instead, you insult people who thought you were really looking for help ..

 

[Diogenes2]

..
Didnt mean to go off topic, just thought about the recent poll where most said they haven't had or used an optical drive in years.

Where do most of these people source their media from ?

There has to be an optical drive in the chain somewhere ...

 

[BFG10K]

Most people here don't even use the 5.25" bays anymore.

So how do "most" people install Windows or watch DVD/Bluray media?

Laptop.

So your laptop has an optical drive but your main desktop - where it would be the most useful - doesn't?