External DVD burner: firewire/USB? Which brand?

FmH · #1 May 19th, 2007, 10:58 AM

Hi!

Has anyone out there good/bad experiences with external DVD+-RW drives?

I think of getting a Philips USB one, so I can use it with my old firewireless PC and my macbook and because I have good experiences with the internal drives (I installed about 7 in friends'/family's PCs; one suddenly stopped reading/writing CDs, but was replaced for free)

The only affordable drives (<100 EUR) with both connections (firewire+USB) are from Plextor. Any known problems with macs?

I had a very short try on a BenQ, but returned it the same day because it would not work with any computer/media brand I tried it on. A friend however is completely satisfied with the same model.

Are there many advantages when using firewire?

Thanks for your help & greetings
Frederick

**fryke** · #2 May 19th, 2007, 11:37 AM

My no-brand external USB-2 with a NEC drive inside works very well with both Apple programs and Toast. It has some trouble with newer DVD-R media, though, but I'm gonna replace its drive with a dual layer capable one soon.

I don't think you can do much wrong with an external USB-2 drive, though. Firewire might have a theoretical advantage, but you can burn at high speeds with USB-2 as well.

Decade · #3 May 26th, 2007, 05:43 PM

I prefer to get a separate external enclosure with Firewire and USB, and any appropriate internal drive. But I like to do extensive research on all my purchases, and that technique gives plenty of material for research. Consequently, I'm using a generic no-name enclosure (I got it several years ago for another purpose-it's not quite optimal), and a Lite-On DVD+/-RW (I got it a couple months ago). It works with all my computers as far as I can tell.

Firewire seems to take less CPU time for the same amount of result compared to USB. On the slower computers, that makes it run more smoothly. Firewire daisy-chains. Also, for some reason, I have more Firewire on older machines than USB 2.

FmH · #4 May 26th, 2007, 07:02 PM

I got a good offer for an LG SuperMulti-Drive and I decided to try this. It has USB only, but works very well so far; even with my PC which is rather picky with USB devices...