What is the best CDR -RW

[joinnra]

I am in the market for a cd r rw and have no idea which is the best. any help would be invaluable. I am really in the dark as to operation and needed software. Please help..??

 

[kramnnim]

If price is no issue, maybe a Yamaha? Plextor seems to be a good brand, same for Lite-On...most drives come with CD burning software, personally I'd look for one that comes with Nero, rather than Easy CD or some other program...

 

[lafn]

I read reader reviews and rating before buying, Plextor is rated high surprisingly yamaha was slow and not so good... I ended up with a TEAC which has been good....
Also I like cd creator 5, nero didn't work as well for me..

Billy

 

[slipe]

Lite-On is good for the price. They have excellent firmware support, where the off brands that rebadge burners like Lite-On often don’t do a very good job with that. Often the firmware updates correct incompatibilities with hardware or software. Some people never need them, but if you have problems it can be very helpful. I think Newegg has the new 52X Lite-On for $63 including shipping. I think the one from Newegg bundles Nero.

Avoid Sony. Nobody has much good to say about the B’s Recorder Gold software that comes with them. I prefer Nero to EZ CD Creator, but they will both do the job. Record Now, which is Prassi based, is good also as is NTI software. http://www.cdrlabs.com/reviews/index.php?reviewid=163

 

[StillLearnin']

joinnra: Great combo----- LiteOn DVD and a LiteOn CDRW. Have had decent track records with Teac and Toshiba DVDs, but better with LiteOn. Outside of the old original ACER brand, LiteOn for CDRW. Software is like AMD vs INTEL. Personally I prefer EasyCDCreatorPlatinum5.xx. DO NOT USE Direct CD--- nothing but problems!!!!!! AS slipe said: stay away from SONY! I found it interesting in the PC World Top 10, there were NO LiteOns; link here:


http://www.pcworld.com/reviews/article/0,aid,107321,00.asp


Here is another great link:


http://www.cdspeed2000.com/go.php3?link=daeresults.php3

hmmm... interesting- slipe & kramnnim - 2 votes- Nero

lafn & StillLearnin' - 2 votes- EZ CD Creator

 

[spaceman_333]

Howdy,

My latest is a BusLink 48x12x50 with Nero that has been great! $39.95 on sale a MicroCenter.

Spaceman

 

[slipe]

“I found it interesting in the PC World Top 10, there were NO LiteOns”

Actually several are likely Lite-Ons. I think they are the largest burner manufacturer in the world now and a large number of rebadged burners are Liteon. If you look at your Liteon DVD and burner you will probably notice Lite-On is on the front of the drive as a sticker rather than painted on, and often doesn’t have a Liteon label at all. I think that is an inventory thing so they can easily put someone else’s name on it.

Their #1 rated TDK is almost certainly a Liteon. TDK makes their own unique blue faceplates, but the back is exactly the same as the Liteon right down to the blue jumper. TDK doesn’t make their own burners but do write their own firmware and do a good job of keeping it up to date. They have rebadged Plextor and Sanyo burners in the past.

Memorex, CenDyne and Pacific Digital don’t make their own and are often rebadged Liteons. Sony hasn’t made their own burners for a while now but I don’t know who makes them.

PC World isn’t the place to go for burner reviews. Both of these sites do comprehensive multi-page tests and reviews: http://www.cdrinfo.com/Sections/Hardware/All.asp and http://www.cdrlabs.com/reviews/

Many rebadged burners carry a “LTR” designation on the back. This means that Liteon made it. There is a little utility available that allows you to flash rebadged Liteons with Liteon firmware. Better to just get a Liteon in the first place.

”hmmm... interesting- slipe & kramnnim - 2 votes- Nero”

Actually I prefer the Prassi engine. I use CloneCD for copy protected CDs, Feurio for audio and Ghost for images. I just want a reliable engine for my mastering software without all the bells and whistles. Prassi claims to more completely maintain the original structure of whatever you are writing, and I have found that to be true. I had hundreds of files to write to CD and there were a few that some clown thought it would be neat to use his last name as the file extension. Nero, EZCD and CDRWin all refused to write the files due to “unknown file types”. The Prassi just wrote it. The copy utility is equally robust with Fireburner being the only other one as good. Prassi will copy Playstation 1 games on the fly at full speed. None of the other mastering software will do that – you have to use something like CloneCD which takes much longer.

Unfortunately they haven’t updated the Prassi for most newer burners since Veritas bought them. Click n’ Burn seems to be exactly the same as the old Prassi Primo CD Plus. Record Now also uses the robust Prassi engine. If I get a new burner I will likely buy Record Now.

If I could have only one piece of burner software on my computer it would be Nero though. The B’s Recorder Gold review from CDRLabs I linked above says this:

”Whether or not you are aware of it, Ahead Software's Nero Burning Rom is the reigning king of software burning suites. It is by far the standard to which all other programs are compared. Many of us will not even bother with the programs bundled by our drive manufactures and install Nero instead. That says a lot right there, as it's the standard we must compare all other burning suites to.”

All of the other sites that do comprehensive burner tests and really know their stuff also use Nero. The person I’m familiar with who is the most knowledgeable about burner software now uses Nero. He was a beta tester for EZCD for years and won’t even consider using it now. Many of the garus also like WinOnCD, but it is available only outside the US.

EZCD got a really bad name with a lot of people when even their XP patch wouldn’t get EZCD5 working properly on XP. They downloaded Nero and it worked so they say EZCD as crappy software. EZCD has all of that sorted out now. The EZCD Platinum package has lots of nice bells and whistles and the program is competent. The packet writing component (DirectCD) is far and away the best packet writing program that comes with standard software. I don’t use packet writing and would never trust a packet written RW as my only source for anything important, but some people put it to good use.

 

[joinnra]

Thank you for the review I asked for, I now can buy with confidence and know that I am getting the best.
Again thank you very much I will tell all my friends