DISCOUNT OPTICAL DRIVES BUYING GUIDE
Optical disk drive uses laser technology. The most common formats of
optical disks are CD and DVD. Optical burners are used to burn or write
large amount of data onto recordable discs.
What you have to consider when buying a DVD burner is whether you want
to write once or rewrite over and over again. DVD burners are of 2
types:
-
DVD-R
(Recordable) burner allows for writing only once onto a blank R
disc.
-
DVD-RW (ReWritable)
burner allows for multiple rewritings onto a blank R/RW disc.
These also apply to CD-RW. Most of the new CD burners today are CD-RW
burners because of the flexibility of writing on either R or RW disc,
and indirectly drive down the demand for CD-R burners.
On the other hand, CD-ROM and DVD-ROM disk drives are only for reading.
CD-ROM drives are still available, but there are limited selections.
A good strategy to use is to install 2 optical disk drives A
high-speed 52x CD-ROM drive and a DVD-RW. You can work with
applications that come in CDs on your CD-ROM and applications that come
in CD/CDR/CDRW/DVD/DVDR/DVDRW on your DVD-RW. This would increase the
life-span of your DVD-RW! Furthermore, you can copy your CD from the
CD-ROM to the DVD-RW. A CD-ROM is fairly cheap today.
Cost of Blank Media
(Disc)
When you buy an optical burner, you should consider the cost of blank
media. A -RW disc would cost you about 4 times more than a -R disc,
depending on the manufacturer.
Speed of CD / DVD
Burner
Ill show you an example of CD-RW / DVD-RW burner speed. A RW drive
with 52x32x52x means it can write up to 52-speed, rewrite up to
32-speed, and read up to 52-speed. DVD-RWs are much slower.
Sizes of CD / DVD
Heres an overview of the capacity of a CD and a DVD:
|
CD / DVD |
Capacity |
|
Data CD |
700 MB |
|
Audio CD |
80 mins |
|
DVD-5 |
4.7 GB |
Types of CD / DVD
Burners
There are 3 types of CD / DVD Burners:
-
Internal
-
External: For
people on the move
-
Combo: A drive
with a combination of CD-RW + DVD
|