Archos MiniCD CD-ROM Drive

Advantages: Price
Disadvantages: Installation

...The Mitsumi 4802TE CD writer is a reasonable budget buy, It is quite complicated to set-up and can conflict with other devices, for example my Mitsumi CD 48x drive! I had to replace my CD ROM drive to get the writer to work, Once the drive is installed it works reliably and produces the results, It is now slow by today’s standards. The software is useless I replaced mine with Adaptec Easy CD Creator. Even though the drive works, you can still buy better for about the same money. I would not recommend this drive to anyone... Read review

Ciao members have rated this review on average off topic

Advantages: Combo drive
Disadvantages: slighly slow CD burn rate compared to others

...I got this drive to eliminate the need for having separate DVD and CDRW drives when I was building a PC for someone. The drive is IDE and lives quite happily on your secondary channel as a master - this is the recommended option to eliminate CD writing failures and DVD playback artifacts. The drive comes complete with CD burning software in the shape of Nero Burning ROM V4, as opposed to the usual suspects of Adaptec Easy CD Creator or CeQuadrat Win On CD. This does not mean that the software is not up to par - far from it! NBR4 can do everything the competition can and more, such as overburning media and bootable CDs. The main reason for this is the DVD read capability. Although the 4x read is somehat behind what most dedicated DVD drives offer nowadays, in reality you only need 1x DVD read to view a movie. Let's face facts - how... Read review

Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful

Advantages: Aztech and Delta drives, as an example, are much cheaper than bigger names
Disadvantages: If you buy cheaper CD ROM drives expect lower performance

...I have mixed feelings about Aztech CD-ROM Drives – and other cheap makes. Everything seemed fine until the speed's started to increase to 24x and beyond. I was used to slower drives and wonder quite why anyone would need a CD-ROM to go so fast – but who am I to know? I have never had any problems with CD-ROM running at around 10 to 16 speed. Anyway, I found on a 32x Aztech drive that it couldn’t get up to full speed without cutting off before it could read data. It was a never-ending loop of stopping and starting, making installation of any program a long drawn out affair. Eventually I had the unit replaced with a Delta CD ROM. It’s better, but still seems to suffer from its high speed at times. I would recommend, and it’s only my opinion, that you spend a bit more and purchase a Yamaha, Philips, Teac or any other well-known brand... Read review

Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful