Drives

DVD Drives

Last Updated: May 13, 2008

Today's Best Choice - Blu-Ray BURNER / HD-DVD Player

The LG GGW-H20L is a burner to create and watch high definition movies on your PC. Make sure your monitor is HDCP (High-bandwidth Digital Content Protection) compliant in order to see the movie.

Read the reviews from owners posted on NewEgg.

Buy it for $300.

Today's Best Choice - Blu-Ray PLAYER / HD-DVD Player

The LG GGC-H20L is a player, not burner, to watch high definition movies on your PC. Make sure your monitor is HDCP (High-bandwidth Digital Content Protection) compliant in order to see the movie.

Read the reviews from owners posted on NewEgg.

Buy it for $200.

Today's Best Choice - DVD Burner, SATA

The Asus DRW-2014L1T works just as fast as an IDE drive without having to worry about the slave/master jumper setting or using larger IDE ribbon cables.

20x DVD-R	20x DVD+R	48x CD-R	8x DVD+R dual layer
6x DVD-RW	8x DVD+RW	32x CD-RW	8x DVD-R dual layer

Read a review from owners at NewEgg.

Buy the black model for $42 (no software).

Today's Best Choice - DVD Burner, IDE

The Pioneer DVR-115DBK rates well and is the least expensive way to watch and burn DVD movies.

20x DVD-R	20x DVD+R	48x CD-R	10x DVD+R dual layer
6x DVD-RW	8x DVD+RW	32x CD-RW	10x DVD-R dual layer

Read a review from owners at NewEgg.

Buy the black model for $34 (no software).

Today's Best Choice - DVD-ROM, IDE

The Sony DDU1615/B2s is a 16X DVD-ROM and 48X CD-ROM drive. It's great as a second drive to make disc to disc copying faster or it works well in building a low cost computer. This model only reads CDs and DVDs. It does not create them.

Read the reviews from owners posted on NewEgg.

Buy it for $24.

Today's Best Choice - DVD Burner for Notebook Computer

The Samsung SN-S082H rates well with owners and is a way to upgrade your notebook's drive. I used a Dremel grinding tool to cut out a notch in the corner of the DVD faceplate so that it would fit in my Lenovo ThinkPad. It was a nice upgrade for an aging computer.

Read the reviews from owners posted on NewEgg.

Buy it for $52.

Software

OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturer) versions of DVD drives don't contain DVD burning software or software to watch DVD movies on your computer.

Watch movies on your computer:

WinDVD 5 sells for as little as $11 that includes the codecs (software codes) needed to watch DVD movies on your computer.
WinDVD 9 sells for $50 on the WinDVD web site.
WinDVD 9 Plus plays Blu-Ray discs for $100.

CD/DVD Burning Software:

Nero 8 Ultra Edition Enhanced is the current version and sells for $100.
Nero 7 Essentials Suite 1 sells for $5.
Roxio Easy Media Creator 10 Suite is the current version and sells for $38.

If I had to choose between the two, I'd opt for Nero. Free software that is available to download off of the internet that works with a CD or DVD burner always has instructions on how to use Nero with its product. Roxio is not always mentioned.

WinDVD, Nero and Roxio are OEM versions, which means they only come with a CD and not a printed manual, installation instructions, retail box/packaging, or technical support. I've almost never need tech support and the one time I did need it, my answer was available on the company web site in the "support" section. See the cheap software section of this web site to learn more about OEM software.

Audio Cable

OEM drives do not come with an audio cable that connects the drive to the sound card. This allows music CDs and DVDs to be heard through the computer speakers. Buy a $1 cable to connect the 4-pin analog connector on the DVD drive to the 4-pin analog connector on the sound card.

Change the Drive Letters in Windows

See the change the drive letter section to prevent the DVD drives from changing drive letters when you add and subtract internal hard drives.

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