W/Intel 925XVC best IDE card to add?

[Evenkeel]

As you know, this mobo comes w/only one IDE channel. I'm trying to decide if it's worth adding a PCI or PCIe card, so I can add a couple more DVD burners. (Don't ask--it's an obsession.) SATA ports maxed out for HDDs.

I've been reading horror stories on incompatibilities in IDE cards, as well as that some work better for hard drives, while others work better for ATAPI/DVD-RW drives. I posted here, rather than "General Hardware", because I hoped those of you familiar w/this mobo might be better equipped to make card suggestions.

Can you guys make some suggestions of cards to look at? Also, I've never added in an IDE card before, so assume I'm a complete idiot about that category of hardware: what are the pros and cons fo doing this? Worst pitfalls? Etc. Thanks.

 

[MustISO]

Plextor makes some SATA DVD-R drives.

 

[Evenkeel]

Sorry, I didn't make it clear in my first post: my 4 SATA ports are in use by hard drives, and that won't change. And secondly, for reasons which are too space-intensive to go into here, I won't be buying any more Plextor drives. (There is quite a discussion on Plextor drives going on in the Plextor sub-forum at Club CD Freaks.)

So back to my original question: assume I need to add an IDE card to this mobo, specifically to run ATAPI drives--i.e. DVD burners. Not hard drives. I'd like advice/recommendations on the best PCI or PCIe IDE cards to use w/this mobo, brand names and models. Thanks.

 

[RalfHutter]

(Sorry for the OT post, but I can't PM you)

Regarding this comment:

Originally posted by: Evenkeel
(There is quite a discussion on Plextor drives going on in the Plextor sub-forum at Club CD Freaks.)

Can you provide a link to the thread you're referring to? I can't find any one particular thread that seens to be "quite a discussion", except for maybe this one: http://club.cdfreaks.com/showthread.php?t=135059. Thanks!

 

[Evenkeel]

Originally posted by: RalfHutter
(Sorry for the OT post, but I can't PM you)

Regarding this comment:

Originally posted by: Evenkeel
(There is quite a discussion on Plextor drives going on in the Plextor sub-forum at Club CD Freaks.)

Can you provide a link to the thread you're referring to? I can't find any one particular thread that seens to be "quite a discussion", except for maybe this one: http://club.cdfreaks.com/showthread.php?t=135059. Thanks!

Yes, sure. I didn't post any links, because there are quite a few threads on the topic, mostly referring to the 716A, spread out throughout the forum. But here's a few:

One
Two
Three
Four

and etc.

If you go thru the forum, just click on anything that references the 716. You'll see a lot of "mystery" issues w/this drive. Some will turn out to be user error, but quite a few will be failed drives. I myself had 2 bad drives, plus a hellish experience w/Plextor USA. The issues are insidious, in that the errors start out small and infrequent, then over a period of days or weeks end up in complete drive failure. For my bad drives, I verified the failure unequivocally via the built-in drive hardware diagnostic.

 

[Evenkeel]

Now back to my original question. Any suggestions...?