[Laffctx]

I was wondering now if it is useless to run both CDrom and CDRW in a puter or is it better.............seems kind of like a waste of a slot ...................is this true or not?

thanx,

Laffctx

 

[V0lt]

I don't know what would best suit you for your purposes, but I have run my computer for 4 years with a CD-RW drive and a ROM drive and I've found it easier than having just the RW drive. First for the sake of being able to have two program disks in at the same time, and also to make sure that the RW drive doesn't gain any wear (I've heard their life is limited compared to a regular CD drive).

Unfortunately for me, my ROM drive just gave out on me

 

[johnwill]

Personally, I've never seen the utility. I have only one machine with two optical drives in it, a DVD and a CD-RW drive. I don't attempt direct CD to CD copies, since it's usually more reliable to write to disk first, and the speed difference is minimal.

I've never heard that CD-RW drives have a shorter life than CD-ROM drives, and it hasn't been my experience. Actually, all of the dead CD drives of any flavor I've run across have been mechanical issues, too many plastic gears and other parts. Also, the tray doesn't seem to hold the heavier cups without breaking!

 

[V0lt]

Yeah I was probably full of crap when I said that. I think what I was trying to say is that since drives wear out with use, you might as well use a regular drive for loading things and then use the burner just to wite disks (assuming you had an extra CD-Rom drive in the first place)

 

[johnwill]

If you shop around, you can find rebate deals on CD-RW drives nowadays for $10 and sometimes less! I just ordered one for $10 from BestBuy.com on a rebate deal, see Stuff-4-Less (disks). At that price, I can afford to wear out the CD-RW drives.

 

[Volt-Schwibe]

i agree

i'd have to agree with johnwill on this one, with the rebates and sales that we have these days i think a burner is about as inexspensive as a rom. i will say that i like to use a regular drive as a test to make sure that a normal drive can read my discs that i burn, as sometimes it is questionable if they will play on a normal one. other than that, the burner is all good. it is nice to have two cd drives, and i like the cd-rw/cd-rom combo, i have to agree that a drive to drive burn is not safe, unless you want to waste a disc also, i have taken home dozens of cd drives that have failed, and i have seen that other than one of them, they all need a lens cleaning. the stupid lens cleaner discs do not work good enough to remove the oils and stuff from ciggarette smoke and they dont really seem to help much at all if your drive has stopped working altogether. in cases where a cd drive failed, i save them from going into the trash can, and i take them home, and i do something i was told never to do. i open them up to the point where i can swab the lens with a q-tip. i am not really gentle about the swabbing and it is a dry q-tip. i do not recommend this if you care about the drive, but if it is headed to the trash, try it. i am using a drive i saved and it has worked perfect for more than a year now, and i recently had to swab my burner for the first time. only one drive i have seen has failed from a broken component, although the laser being dirty isnt what i call a failure. either way, one burner and no other cd drive is perfectly acceptable, and some software wont let you do a one drive burn if you have two. wouldnt that suck? anyways, good to see the forum is working good good to see people getting help thank you guys again,

BoB