Drives > Argosy Research Drives

Advantages: Slim, lightweight, relatively inexpensive, writes CD's quickly
Disadvantages: Noisy, lots of movement whilst reading from drive

Having a laptop without an optical drive meant that I had to go for an external solution. After doing a lot of research, I had a pretty good idea of what was out there for me. A fortuitous trip to Singapore allowed me to get this device at a 30% discount to what I would have paid at home. It is now possible to get these devices on ebay at the same sort of price I paid. And that price is well worth it. These devices are considerably cheaper than ...
...Iomega and Targus. What this device lacks in high-street crdibility, it makes up for in quality. The drive is, as the name suggests, quiet slim and very portable. It is the length and breadth of a CD, and about 1 1/2 cm's thick. If you get two CD cases and put them on top of each other, then thats pretty much the size of it. The silver top of the drive is metal, whilst the grey bottom is moulded plastic. The case gives a re-assurig feel of ruggedness. ... Read review

Advantages: "works" with Mac and Windows
Disadvantages: Too many to list.

...work... (using Taiyo Yuden media bought from Microboards authorised retailers) >Manuals... inexistent! After days of bugging their support, a PDF was emailed over... > Support - rude and unhelpful most of the time. Takes days to get anything out of them In short? Stay well clear from this product! ... Read review

Advantages: Fast Write speeds, wide compatibilty, 20 speed dvd writing and CHEAP
Disadvantages: Not any that i've experienced!!

I found this to be an excellent drive as i picked up one for around £30 and that was when it came out(last year, june). I think that this is an excellent drive for the fact it has a wide range of DVD and CD writing features; 20 speed writing, my favourite feature is the light scribe feature which allows you to design your own cd labels on a special 'lightscribe disc'. The Drive was also quiet, but not too quiet. I found the OEM Box that the drive ... Read review

Advantages: Very Cheap, Changeable cover panels, Fast Speed
Disadvantages: No firmware, Region Locked, Major issues with burning regular cd's

...and thus bought it as LG has become more reputable. The Pros This drive was very easy to install. It was practically a plug and play drive. It also came with different front panels in order to change colors from black and white. Although this may seem pointless it is a factor to take into consideration if you are after certain specification like color for your computer. The drive has never had a problem playing any cd's DVD's and etc. It ...
...this drive as it seems LG has forgotten about this drive and moved on. 3) This final problem is the killer part of this drive and the reason it is ranked so low. When durng xvid files and various other files onto a CD to watch on an xvid player and part of the files which are over 350 mb will not work. Thus typically TV shows are 350 mbs and meaning half the disc is wasted. Despite the cheap prices of CD's these days it still is a waste. Conclusion ... Read review

Advantages: Permanent disc labelling
Disadvantages: Monochrome and media is hard to find

LG Super Multi DVD Rewriter GSA-E60N These days most new PCs come supplied with a built-in DVD writer, indeed the last PC I bought more than a year ago provided one in the standard price. So with a perfectly good writer already in my tower case why do I need this rather blocky external one taking up space on my desk? Well this writer comes with the nifty bonus of being a LightScribe drive, a permanent disc labelling system that provides a high quality ...
...are running out. The LG Super Multi DVD Rewriter That superlative laden model name is a bit cumbersome so from now on I'll refer to it by its model reference: GSA-E60N. The GSA-E60N is a pretty ugly piece of kit, and I won't pretend otherwise. A blocky, bulky lump of black plastic it looks like something from the mid nineties, a time when design aesthetics had no place in the personal computing world, the only concession being a thin silver strip ... Read review