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Thread ID: 55388 2005-03-09 08:30:00 DVD Writer - Internal or external? Tony (4941) Press F1
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332268 2005-03-09 08:30:00 What are the pros and cons of internal (IDE/ATAPI) vs external (USB) DVD writers? Apart from the obvious one of portability! :)

Has any one experience of the DSE Cyberdrive DVD writers?
Tony (4941)
332269 2005-03-09 08:52:00 cons of external: they are more expensive than internal Prescott (11)
332270 2005-03-09 08:56:00 cons of external: they are more expensive than internalI think the difference is narrowing. I was in DSE today and they have an external writer for $149 and the website has an internal one for $144 - both this cyberdrive brand. (unless I totally mis-read it, I was on my way out of the shop at the time.) Tony (4941)
332271 2005-03-09 09:01:00 oh, sounds like a bargin, there is crap all price difference then, if you want to use the dvd writer with other computers and you are on the go, then an external maybe the one for you, it will really depend what you are going to do with it Prescott (11)
332272 2005-03-09 09:01:00 Cyberdrive isn't a brand, its a badge, You would be doing well to find out what exactly the drive is before laying down the gold.

And what software is provided.

Thats not to say it isn't a good drive or thats its a poor package but I wouldn't buy a DSE anything blindly.
Metla (12)
332273 2005-03-09 09:37:00 Drives, in general, work better under IDE or SATA than USB or Firewire.

The convenience of being able to move an external, is about all it has going for it unless your short of drive bays.
Murray P (44)
332274 2005-03-09 09:38:00 Cyberdrive isn't a brand, its a badge, You would be doing well to find out what exactly the drive is before laying down the gold.

And what software is provided.What do you mean by "exactly what the drive is" - it's capabilities, which are listed on the box, or the maker of the guts - how would I find that out?
What software should I expect?
Tony (4941)
332275 2005-03-09 10:14:00 I mean the actual manufacturer of the drive, But its up to you if that matters or not, You can purchase Asus, lite-on, Samsung and other good quality gear for around the same price as that rebadged-who-knows-what-it-is.

As for drive capabilities, these have settled and no matter what brand or where you purchased it from you would want to be getting a 16x speed drive with dual layer capabilites. This would satisfy the needs of 99% of the buying public, with the more advanced features quite useless to near everybody.

As to software.

You would want

Nero
An Authoring app for making DVD's that play in a standalone player
DVD playing software.

Looking at the DSE site, they don't specify what software is bundled, Though they do on the external drive, which is $218 and just a internal drive mounted in a caddy...Laughable how they provide the free app DVD decripter, then state they don't suport its use, which is to get around copy protected media.
Metla (12)
332276 2005-03-09 19:22:00 I mean the actual manufacturer of the drive, But its up to you if that matters or not, You can purchase Asus, lite-on, Samsung and other good quality gear for around the same price as that rebadged-who-knows-what-it-is.


According to the various CD/DVD sites out there the Cyberdrive (Cyberhome) drives though based on Philips technology aren't rebadged Benqs like most other "Philips" drives but similar in performance. The Benq 1620 is available in NZ for less than $130 delivered.

The software with drives can be a plus or a cutdown version that you end up replacing anyway.
PaulD (232)
332277 2005-03-09 19:29:00 Im not a fan of Benq drives... Had a bad run in with them a while back...

You're really better off going to pricespy.co.nz and finding another/better drive there :)
Chilling_Silence (9)
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