[Macworld]

Post your comments for Macworld Buying Guides: Optical drives here

[tyleromeo]

Not sure how you guys missed Pioneer's internal Blu-ray drive (BRD-203). It sells for $230 or less and it is an 8X Single & Dual Layer Blu-ray burner.

[mariorelvas]

Hi
When reviewing these drives you never talk about Apple Burning Support. Is it not an issue? iTunes, iMovie, and iDVD burning directly it is very important when considering a drive, don't you think so?
Best regards
Mario

[g4cube]

As of late 10.4.x and definitely 10.5.x, generic burning support is provided for most external DVD drives, as long as they are "standard". this makes most any CD or DVD drive of recent vintage supported by the iLife and iTunes apps.
Apple also provided a mechanism for drive specific profiles; earlier versions of OS X required drive specific profiles, and companies like LaCie provided these profiles for downloads. Apple System Profiler reports whether the driver profile is Apple supported or vendor supported.
OS X 10.3.x and earlier required specific profiles for successful burning.
As a rule, almost all modern CD and DVD drives in the market are supported by OS X 10.5.x.
At the present time, Apple has NO support for burning Blu-ray disks in any format, or for that matter, no way to play Blu-ray videos. Apps like Toast permit Blu-ray burning in various formats. the issue is quite complex, and will require some effort from Apple to resolve.

[AAdams]

This is an excellent topic for MacWorld to research - and then write an objective, informed article. I would write the article based on practicality - what's going to work for most users.
Certain types of media should probably be avoided entirely, despite their apparent advantages. Their reliability and compatibility are extremely limited. The functionality and longevity of perhaps 50% of the available DVD media is very limited (like from 0 months to 6 months). Error correction on different media varies in reliability. Viterbi error correction is more robust than older methods. A great deal of "factory" firmware is very poor, and even dysfunctional.
I sure the manufacturers and OEM's will contribute to your research.
The points listed above are all pertinent issues to be investigated for a meaningful article. The consumer is spending millions of hours, and billions of dollars, on technology that is borderline functional. MacWorld can to a great service to its readers by investigating the optical drive products of its advertisers.

[EdWaldrup]

New Sony Blu-ray burner last October. After purchasing a BD-RE blank disk I proceeded to remove the hard drives in the Early 2008 MacPro. Included in the BWU-300S was all necessary adapter cabling and screws. Mechanically, the tray front plate to the burner needed to be removed. After easily removing the Optical drive support assembly cage I proceeded to locate an available SATA connector on the mother board. Once the SATA cable was routed and connected the power adapter cable was atached. The drive was bolted to the cage and the cage reinserted into the MacPro.
Next I attempted to play a Blu-ray movie. The disk did mount on the desktop but would not play. Now for the finale. I inserted a blank new rerecordable TDK disk from Frys. I chose a 600Mb HD video file that was edited in Final Cut and dragged and dropped onto Toast 9 in the video mode. The Blu-ray option was highlighted. I clicked the record button and it began recording. This was a 3 minute HDV shot Quicktime file. After recording I placed the disk in my new Sony BDP-S550 Blu-ray player. It spun up and played. The result was a 20+ Mb per second beautiful playback of my Swiss Rail video. It met and exceeded my expectations. Aside from the inability for now to play commercial Blu-ray disks (I only tried one disk) I am completely satisfied with the burner and Toast 9 with the Blu-ray add on software. I feel very fortunate for this to work as well as it did. Perhaps the wisest thing is to purchase one re recordable disk in case of problems. Now if only Apple will get off their behinds and add capability to DVD studio Pro for Blu-ray. In a recent FCP survey to me I did request Blu-ray capability. We will see come this month or next.

[gandhi]

It may just be that I am superstitious, but I SWEAR Firewire allows for much higher actual speeds than their USB counterparts, even when the USB drives are rated as being faster.
Just thought I'd add that.

[hillstones]

Where is he finding CD-R's that are 800 MB in size? Faster burn speeds doesn't always mean better results, especially with Audio CD's. The other benefit of an external 5.25 drive is faster read speeds than the slot-load drives in iMacs and MacBooks/Pros. They are also more reliable too.

[g4cube]

For hard drives, yes, FireWire is typically faster than USB.

But for optical drives, the faster speed doesn't really matter too much - why? The read and write speeds of most optical drives, whether reading or writing, is well within the rates supported by USB2 or FW400. FW800 on an optical drive is wasted.

[gmanning]

I have found that the easiest way to do blu-ray high def is to use Sony software under bootcamp. There are too many hoops to jump through on the Apple side at the present time.

[Mac_Karma]

I know this a bit dated but I've been, and continue to be, a fan of magneto-optical technology for basic storage needs. It's secure and very fast. Unlike the convoluted and slow process of CD/DVD technology, MO works like a hard drive -- add and delete files at will.
It's annoying that this technology didn't get traction in the US. It's like the old VHS vs BetaMax days where BetaMax was far and away a superior technology (that's why the broadcast industry standardized on it) but the combination of ignorance of consumers and marketing by VHS made VHS the dominant format.
Had MO technology gotten the recognition it deserved I feel it's capacity would have increased similarly to DVD. Fujitsu had been our last oasis for MO but they've also thrown in the towel. How sad.

[ilarynx]

LightScribe "professional looking?" A matter of opinion, I suppose, but not an opinion I share. When has anyone bought a CD or DVD at the store that used LightScribe instead of a printed disk? Never? By definition then, LightScribe is not professional.
I've printed labels for all my CDs and DVDs for years now. I currently use the Artisan 810 and it's a quick and simple process to print TRULY professional looking labels on your disks.

[DPG4450Guy]

I recommend OWC's Mercury Pro Quad-Interface drive - USB, FW 400, 800, eSata - very affordable, very fast, nicely designed.

[bigpoppa206]

Bought a brand new Plextor drive and it is NOT fully supported under Snow Leopard, so be careful. Audio CDs never burn at the correct slower speeds.