Everyone has optical drives and as time has passed they’ve gotten faster and faster, one problem I’ve encountered though is that for newer drives there is no media for the latest speeds, something I’ve never been able to quite figure out. IDE is becoming obsolete, with SATA becoming the new standard, first it was hard drives now more and more companies are coming out with optical SATA drives as well. On a personal note I’ve moved now to all SATA connections, so no more IDE for me in my main system.

Today I’ve got a combination review and article for you, more of a roundup, or comparison piece really. Samsung sent me their new Super Write-Master 22X DVD burner for review, just the drive though, the OEM version basically, and I’ve been meaning to do a small article about optical drives, comparing their speeds, so I figured why not incorporate the new Samsung into the article.

The Super Write-Master features LightScribe, which I’m sure everyone knows about by now, but it’s main feature is of course the speed of the drive, writing DVDs at 22x, though there is no media capable of that yet that I know of. Another great feature of this drive is the SpeedPlus which is an optomised algorithm for writing at the fastest possible speeds, along with that the drive also features Speed Adjustment Technology, low noise and Buffer Under Run Technology. I’ve put the Samsung up against four other drives for comparison, and interestingly, during my testing I found the Super Write-Master will burn a 16x DVD at over 18X speeds, coming in at just a little over 5 minutes to burn a DVD, with the closest competitor coming in at almost 6 minutes.

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Digital content is becoming more and more popular because it’s convenient  and easily fairly easy to access online. You can go to sites and buy movies to watch them, but you’re restricted most times to just your computer and maybe another device and usually no real physical media in your hands. I’m old school, I like to have a physical product in my hands, not only to make me feel secure about my purchase but it just feels good to have something tangible to show for what you bought.

Today I’ve got sort of a combo review for you, it’s of the new Roxio Venue service and the specialized DVD burner that accompanies it. Roxio Venue is an online store where you can purchase movies, but what makes Venue different is that you not only have the digital version of the movie to watch but you can burn it to DVD to watch in a standard DVD player. In other words your digital media purchase is now a tangible thing that you can feel, touch and even take with you to share with friends or family. These are what is normally called Burn-to-DVD-Downloads. In order to do this though you’ve got to have a special Qflix enabled DVD burner and special Qflix blank DVDs as well as they’re essentially a form of DRM. Normally I’m against DRM, but this type works for me as it offers me something tangible that I can touch and actually see a physical manifestation of my purchase, unlike something that remains on my computer in digital form.

Roxio was kind enough to set me up with an account to give you a walk through of how it works and of course provided me with a Qflix enabled burner and discs to go with it.

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Every computer out there today has some sort of optical drive in it, they all pretty much have too to access media and install programs, the types and capabilities vary but they’re pretty much all the same.

Portable optical drives on the other hand can be different, they can be small, slim styled drives or full sized in a portable enclosure to hook up via your USB port. These are not really that much different than their internal cousins, but some companies add increased functionality to set their products apart from other on the market to add value and of course make them more attractive to the end consumer. One such company is Liteon, they’ve got a line of portable optical DVDRW drives called the EZ-DUB. These drives feature a standard sized, fully featured, optical drive inside of an external enclosure, but what makes these special is the addition of two touch sensitive buttons labeled ‘File and ‘Dub’ to make common functions easily accessible to the end user.  Is the EZ-DUB worth your money, are the extra features worth it?

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