Tech:Building your own PC/Optical Drives

TSR Wiki > Life > Computing and Technology > Building your own PC > Optical Drive

To use CDs, DVDs or Blu-ray Discs you will need a suitable optical drive. For example, if you want to install the Windows Vista operating system you will need a DVD reader. To burn your own discs, you will need a writer. In most cases, writers can read and burn discs, but readers can only read discs. Also take note that CD drives cannot access DVD or Blu-ray discs, and DVD drives cannot access Blu-ray discs. Since you can have a good DVD drive for under £20 it doesn’t make sense to opt for a CD drive any more. The price difference between DVD readers and writers are negligible so it’s worth going with a writer in case you want to burn a disc later on. At the time of writing, Blu-ray writers are almost twice as expensive than readers. Blu-ray readers can be had for about £70, but writers are well over £120.

Connectivity

Depending on what your motherboard will allow, you have the choice of using either SATA or IDE to connect your internal device. I prefer SATA for the thinner cable size, but check to make sure your motherboard has enough SATA ports. Remember that you may need to connect a hard drive to one. External optical drives are also available which are easily portable and connect through a USB port.

Supported Formats

CDs are produced in CD-R, CD-RW or CD-ROM formats. Most have a 700MB capacity, but some models may only hold 650MB. CD-R can only be written to once, but read many times, whereas CD-RW can be rewritten about a thousand times. CD-ROM can only be read from, not written to. Most audio CD players, such as the one in your car, will only play audio files off a CD-R disc, and this will hold approximately 80 minutes of music.

Less popular mini CDs are available in capacities of 155MB, 195MB or 210MB. They work in similar ways to CDs but only have an 80mm diameter. Most tray based optical drives will have an 'inner well' where you can load the mini CD, however laptop devices will attach the mini CD directly to the spindle. Driver software for some appliances is distributed on mini CD, so make sure you have a compatible device if you want to use it.

DVDs are available in DVD+R, DVD+R DL (Dual Layer), DVD+RW, DVD-R, DVD-R DL (Dual Layer), DVD-RW, DVD-RAM and DVD-ROM. By standard, they can hold up to 4.7GB per disc but the DVD+/-R DL discs have the ability to hold up to 8.5 GB of data per disc.

Blu-ray discs can store up to 25GB in single layer, or 50GB in dual layer. If you want to burn a Blu-ray disc, you have the choice using either BD-RE (re-writeable) or BD-R (recordable) as blank media. You can only read from and cannot write to a BD-ROM.

The optical drives supported formats will indicate which type of disc it can use. When looking for a CD, DVD or Blu-ray reader/writer, only buy one which supports the type of disc you intend to use. DVD and Blu-ray writers will usually burn CD-R audio CDs.

Speed

An optical drives speed is measured in x units, such as 16x. The higher the number, the faster your discs will be read/written. Another factor that affects speed is the buffer. Most DVD drives will have a 2MB buffer, and Blu-ray drives either 4MB or 8MB. When it comes to the drives access times, shorter is better; then again if an optical drive is not something that you use regularly you might not care too much about its speed.

LightScribe

Drives with the lightscribe feature can print a physical image onto the disc itself in black and white. This may help you to label the disc, or to add a picture. I have never found the need to use this feature, but if you do not have a lightscribe writer, do not attempt to use the lightscribe feature in your burning program. Lightscribe enabled devices may cost a little bit more than ones without the feature.

LabelFlash

Similar to LightScribe but less common.

Blu-ray

Blu-ray is the accepted de-facto standard for high definition video. Many new drives coming onto the market are capable of reading Blu-ray discs, and you should consider this if you enjoy watching movies on your computer and have a sufficiently large screen. It's concievable that in the future, games shall begin to be released on BD discs, so purchasing a Blu-ray drive may be advisable if you wish to futureproof your PC.