Need suggestions for a reliable external CD drive

Hi,

For my trustworthy T500 I now need to switch from Internal CD drive usage to external (need the room for 2. harddrive). Usb2 or Firewire...whatever is best and most reliable.

I just need a reliable external drive that has proven to make little or no errors when ripping from audio e.g. from ITunes. Price, speed, noise etc is completely irrelevant...

Suggestions?

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Werner

 

I've had my Samsung external for nearly 2 years now, works like a charm.

Micro Center - Samsung SE-S084F 8X Slim USB 2.0 External DVD Writer 039917

 

Been using an Iomega external with my netbook /travels for about 6 months - no issues so far.

 

Actually, all you'd need would be an external SATA enclosure, if it's a SATA optical drive. If you're happy with USB 2.0, then you can get one for less than $10! Problem solved.

I don't know about Firewire, which pretty much dead, but ESATA is always a possibility, although it gets pricey.

Of course, you might not even need an enclosure, but a SATA to ESATA cable. You could even use the bare optical drive with just the cable?

 

Well actually I don't think I'll be happy with USB2. I need this to be "high performance" drive that must act as a share for 3 clients on a LAN.

Also, I need 2 HDD's as well as the CD drive. I only have USB2 and Firewire. The plan was to get me an adapter so that the new HDD could fit were the optical CD is located - of course this means that I must get an external CD...

--
Werner

 

What is the model?

--
Werner

 

Thanks, I'll look into that model.

--
Werner

 

Okay, I really don't think you understood my suggestion. You can potentially take your current DVD drive, if it's SATA, and put it into a USB 2.0 drive enclosure, giving you an external optical drive. An external enclosure is a lot cheaper than an entirely new drive and you can use your current drivers.

 

As Tsunade mentioned in the first reply; I've had the very similar Samsung SE-S084B USB 2.0/8X DVD-RW Drive as well since April of '09; Been working well.

 

No external optical drive without power supply for me.
The power demand of these units is three times the value defined by the USB specifications. Thus, reliable operation can not be expected.

Michael

 

Meh you don't get a warranty for those premade drives. Plus you can ever achieve the slimness of prebuilt drives. And I've never had a Samsung/LG ODD fail on me yet.

 

In a worst case scenario, it will not be your 40 USD host powered ODD that will fail, it will be the USB port(s) of your 800+ USD laptop.
Only due to the greed of the ODD manufacturers not throwing a PSU (manufacturing cost: 1 USD) into the box and even not soldering a power terminal onto the PCB. I'd rather spend 10 USD more on such a unit.

The only spec-compliant slim ODDs are sold by Sony - they ship their drives with a PSU.

Michael

 

Asus makes this (except mine is straight glossy black without the "weave style" design). I have had mine since July of last year and it works great.

 

USB 2.0 has a practical upper throughput of around 30 MiB/s, although I think this might be two-way (theoretical upper limit of USB 2.0 is 60 MiB/s total... sans overhead). A 24x DVD-ROM drive has a listed data rate of 30.9 MiB/s. So unless your external DVD drive runs faster than 24x DVD-ROM (or around 30x CD-ROM), the speed of the drive will hit it's limits before the USB connection does. Datawise, at least.

 

Completely untrue. My former external HP drive although it had a USB Y cable, only needed one and I could burn discs reliably. Most externals include a Y cable just in case they need that kind of power.

 

Well doesn't it all depend on the notebook/desktop in question? Some notebooks supply enough power through 1 USB port to power the external ODD but some do not..

 

The USB port is standard. They all provide the same power (save for USB hubs). Some, like thinkpads, provide a "powered" USB port which supplies more than typical power.

 

They're all intended to, although some manufacturers "cheap out" and their USB ports can't always provide full power... especially if they're all being utilized. I believe, though, that a lot of the Y-cables were originally intended for USB 1.1, which had a lower power specification, and thus definitely required 2 ports for full power.

 

We're talking about optical drives, don't we?
Look onto the sticker of the drive. You will see a power rating like 1500 mA there.
Next step: Read the USB specs. They are available for free on USB.org website. You will find that an USB port will provide 500 mA if requested by the device and 100 mA without device request.

So, why do you consider a piece of hardware that requires up to 300% of the rated power of an USB port as spec compliant?

You were just lucky. Or did the manufacturer of your computer specify the USB port being capable of delivering that much power?
And these Y-cables are *cough* borderline. They are not spec compliant also, plus you will gain only additional 100 mA.

I am not aware of any laptop manufacturer who officially states "our USB ports can handle 1500 mA".
If they could, then they would probably advertise this as "Ultra Hi Power USB ports" or something like this.

Michael

 

I have a lite-on external duel layer drive that I have had for 2 years and it only requires one usb port. Newegg.com - LITE-ON 8X DVD+R 8X DVD+RW 8X DVD-R 6X DVD-RW 8X DVD-ROM 24X CD-R 24X CD-RW 24X CD-ROM USB Black 8X External Slim DVD Writer Model eSAU208-111 LightScribe Support

I bought the red one and I have not had a single coaster.

 

Is that so? Then why is it that I can burn blu-rays on my external blu-ray burner with a USB Y cable? You are claiming that they only provide xx amount of amperage, but you are forgetting voltage. Please, before this turns into an argument, please do better research before you spout off things you obviously know nothing about.

Please refer to this link. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Serial_Bus#Power
It says,

Which says, a single standard USB port is capable of delivering up to 500milli-amps @ 5V, which translates to 2.5watts per port. Which therefore a Y cable could provide up to 5watts of power.

Yet a little farther down, it says

so they can actually provide up to 1500milli-amps per port, which brings it up to 7.5watts each.

 

I don't even know why this is a conversation. I've been using the Samsung DVD-Rom drive (which I linked to IMFP) with my netbook via only the one main port of the USB Y cable; Done numerous burning w/out any issue whatsoever. Even used it to install Windows 7.