I’m interested in getting a burner. I don’t care if it’s something particularly fancy, as I’d like to have it for making music CDs and for the occasional backup copies of other CDs. I don’t know very much about them, so I was wondering if people here could give me the lowdown and possibly some recommendations.
See, as a general rule I don’t trust those people with the blue polo shirts in the computer department at Best Buy - I’ve seen them in action before. I kinda sorta maybe halfway trust you guys… just a little bit.
Well, the first thing you need to know is do you want an internal or an external - internal goes inside and requires you to open your computer, while an external sits outside your computer and is probably connected through a usb port.
Second, is speed. Externals CD Burners are often times not as fast as internal CD Burners. Basically, what I would suggest is that you get the best you can for the least amount of money, which is something I see you doing anyway, so this shouldn’t be an issue. Now, the only thing I’m not too sure about is what the numbers mean. When you look at a box, you should see something like 8x12x24. They mean read speed, write speed and something else, but I dont remember which numbers mean which, but the higher the number the better, and more expensive. Internal Burners are also, I think, a bit more expensive.
These things are where the internet comes in real handy. Ebay, www.pricewatch.com , and company owned auction sites (a distributor auctions off things instead of people) are all pretty good bets.
It’s been a while since I had to do stuff like that, so Im not too keen anymore. Hope I helped.
Ok, so to wrap it up, most CD Rom Drives in computers are 24x. So your cd read speed can be something low, since you aren’t presumably using it for anything outside burning. Overwrite should be relativly fast if you want to burn over things pretty quickly, and your write speed should be the fastest.
Just be careful, and don’t buy the first and the best. Think about what you are going to use it for, and look at the specifications in the light of that. There’s no need to pay extra for a lot of fancy dancy functions you don’t need.
The rest has, more or less, already been said by Xelopheris and Sorcerer.
These days you can buy a good burner for what is really a pittance. There are several key things to remember:
Brandnames tend to come with better technical support and also tend to have better warrenties.
Speed is not realy so important. Unless you are buying second hand, the lowest speed for writing is about 40x, which is much faster than a home user would really need.
If going internal, make sure you have room! You need a spare IDE input to use an internal drive. A quick and easy test is to count up the number of cd drives and Hard drive in your computer. If there are less than 4 then you are probably safe
4)If the drive is external remember that the speeds on the box most older motherboards can not perform at. This means that you can set the burn speed too high and cause a buffer underrun (frag the cd :P).
5)If you can, get a burner with bundled software (Nero is good for the experts, but if you are just beginning then Adaptec Easy CD Creator is probably the simplest to use) as this is an additional expense that you have to invest in. (In other words, you will need the burner AND the software so make sure you buy a package if possible, as it tends to be cheaper).
Personally im using an Acer 16x10x40 (cost me $300 back in the day :P) and it has never let me down. They live forever those things, so I would not worry unduly about the durablity of the internals. The externals tend to break a lot (worked in a technical department) and also hav lots of compatability issues. Internals are cheaper and more reliable, so I would recommend them.
My computer’s on the older side - my parents bought it for me for school in fall of 1999. (Go ahead and laugh, you highly advanced users). I’m pretty sure I have room for it, but I’m curious - would this be a replacement for my CD drive or in addition to it?
It would be an addition, however depending on how fast the burner is in comparison to your cd drive it could be a replacement. But if your going to be copy cd’s, you need to have two cd drives.
Originally posted by Charlemagne
[b]I’m sorry, Vicki, You are one of the most respectable people at RPGC, in my opinion. But I have to do this whenever a thread like this comes up…
Try formating your hard drive.
please forgive me… [/b]
Presenting: Charlemagne’s computer problem floatchart
I used a 48x Write, 24x rewrite, & 50x read Samsung that I installed onto my comp not so long ago, I think it was about the time I got my scanner & my 40 GB HD… Anyways, I used to have Easy CD Creator, but it wouldn’t let me burn until i paid for platinum, so I got Nero & downloaded a hack, then got me FireBurner for ISO burning, since FireBurner only burns ISOs & it’s free.
CD Burners are pretty cheap now. You can get a burner that writes at or faster then 48x for about 60 dollars if you shop around.
