Freecom Portable CD-ROM Drive

Advantages: Portable, cheap
Disadvantages: uses a lot of CPU

...I bought the Freecom portable DVD-ROM drive for my laptop, which only had an internal CD ROM drive. I wanted to play DVD's and was able to do so. The drive is external, and connects to any computer via a parallell port, firexire, USB or PC card, through the PCMCIA slot of a laptop. If the PCMCIA port also has ZV (Zoomed Video) capability, it is a huge bonus. It came with an excellent driver, and software, and was easy enough to install on Windows ME (it is also supported by NT, 95, 98, XP etc). However, I did find that the picture and sound were quite jerky, and sometimes almost unwatchable. I got around this by buying a hardware MPEG II decoder card ("Dvd-to-go", from Margi systems), which sorted out the problem. But I was lucky that I happened to have 2 PCMCIA slots, as it turned out i needed both: one for the Freecom card and one... Read review

Ciao members have rated this review on average somewhat helpful

Advantages: ummmmm
Disadvantages: Doesn't work very well, slow, intermitently recognises disks, poor back up service, need I go on?

...I ordered my Freecom DVD Recorder LS USB 2.0 after my CD/DVD drive packed up on my 15 month old HP Desktop. I wanted it mainly to load CD ROM and burn DVD's from movies already converted to DVD format on my hard drive. Being that my PC had no disk drive I relied upon this external drive to load the bundled DVD burning software (Roxio 9). This took several days and many attempts. Then I tried burning my first DVD. After taking 3 hours to do a task that previously took about 30 minutes, this recorder produced a disc that no dvd player in my home recognised (and I have 4). I found the user interface very unfriendly and it simply didn't work. Needles to say, I'll be getting a refund!... Read review

Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful

Advantages: Plug and Play. Not expensive. Can be moved between different computers
Disadvantages: Not a lot!

...of Windows 98 or higher, have at least a Pentium 2 processor with a speed of not less than 233 MHz, and at least 64 Mb of RAM. Of course, you'll also need a CD Rom drive in order to install the software, and it's handy if you have an Internet connection in case you need to download any new or updated drivers from the Freecom website, or need any further technical support from their online help desk. ~ ~ The drive comes packaged with all you'll need to get you up and running within minutes, including a USB cable to connect it to your computer. As I already mentioned earlier, I paid €84.99 (£58.44 Sterling) for the drive in the PC World sale. As always, it's best to shop around on the Web or here at Ciao for the best price available. Highly recommended by the mad cabbie. © KenJ January 2005... Read review

Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful