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dfbennett · Apr 14, 2001, 04:19 PM

Hi,
I've got a G4 350 with 256mb of RAM running OS X and 9.1. I currently have an Adaptec 2906 SCSI card and a Lacie 4X CDR(Panasonic Mechanism). I'm seriously considering purchasing a new Firewire CD-RW drive and selling the SCSI card and old drive. Anyhow, my big thing is I want to be able to use the drive with iTunes. I can't use my current drive with iTunes and since I use iTunes as my MP3 player I figure it's the most convienent way to burn audio. Anyhow, I'm looking at a firewire drive as I'd like to keep my internal dvd drive(not so much for DVD but just to be able to do disc to disc copies). I'd like atleast 8x write speed, and 4x rewrite speed(my old drive was write only so I'm used to not having it at all). Also, should I get a drive with burn proof? I found a 12x Firewire drive from www.clubmac.com which has a Teac Mechanism and burn proof but I'm not sure if there are better deals out there. I've heard mixed things about the Que drives. Anyhow I'd like to spend less than $300 and I'd be willing to go with a 8x burn drive over a 12x if there was a considerable difference in price. Again, iTunes compatibility is a must. Anyhow thanks for any help. Now if only we could get burning in OS X.

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Regards,
Dave

Apr 14, 2001, 10:42 PM

www.formac.com

get their 12x -- burn proof, just reduced to $259, the best design in the business.

ciao.

dfbennett · Apr 14, 2001, 10:48 PM

Originally posted by gg_pismo:
www.formac.com

get their 12x -- burn proof, just reduced to $259, the best design in the business.

ciao.

Um, I looked on their page and the model you mention is still listed at $279. Thanks for the reccomendation though.

Edit:Also the drive you mentioned is listed as NOT compatible with iTunes 1.1 on the formac web page.

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Regards,
Dave

[This message has been edited by dfbennett (edited 04-14-2001).]

power96 · Apr 16, 2001, 05:04 PM

I'VE BEEN DOING A LOT OF RESEARCH ABOUT CD-RW AND I CAN TELL THAT QPS QUE FIREWIRE 16X10X40 IS ONE OF THE BEST OPTIONS. A NEW LACIE IS COMING OUT THAT LOOK GOOD TOO.

austeros · Apr 16, 2001, 08:01 PM

the que drives rock... i have used a usb, a 8x4x32x firewire, and the 16x high endone and they all kick ass.

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-rok

dfbennett · Apr 16, 2001, 08:34 PM

I've heard mixed reviews of the que. I heard a nasty rumor that firmware updates must be done from a firewire equipped wintel box which kind of turned me off from the Que. Still though, I'll look into it some more. Thanks for the reccomendations.

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Regards,
Dave

murbot · Apr 18, 2001, 01:50 AM

i had a 12x QPS CDRW and thought it was great, but had no frame of reference for the speed. I just read this review here that makes it look pretty slow in comparison to a few others...

Sorry I don't have a great recommendation for you, in fact I am looking a little too, in case I end up buying a dual 450 and need to buy a CDRW.

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[removed at the request of Apple Legal]

OverclockedHomoSapien · Apr 18, 2001, 08:59 PM

I've got a Sony firewire burner, model # 1600 I think, 12/8/32. It rocks. Very fast, solid case, and quiet. I bought it after much research. Money as no object I would have bought the 16X Yamaha, but I'm not loaded so I scored this Sony for 309 at outpost.

Stay away from Lacie drives, they are unreliable. I got burned on a Lacie drive that refused to burn audio CDs without inter-track audio snippets and garbled tracks. Their tech support did nothing and was downright RUDE (told me flat out, "if you had bought a SCSI drive you wouldn't have this problem"). This Sony is like a wet dream after fighting Lacie for 6 months.

slimpy · Apr 18, 2001, 10:07 PM

Originally posted by OverclockedHomoSapien:
Stay away from Lacie drives, they are unreliable. I got burned on a Lacie drive that refused to burn audio CDs without inter-track audio snippets and garbled tracks. Their tech support did nothing and was downright RUDE (told me flat out, "if you had bought a SCSI drive you wouldn't have this problem").

Which Lacie drive did you have? What mechanism was in it?

wumeng · Apr 21, 2001, 04:02 PM

I'd wholeheartedly recommend the Yamaha CRW-2100 which is available as a FireWire model. It has a 16w10rw40r configuration and has given me many minutes (not hours as it's so fast!) of problem-free burning since I got it!

DBursey · Apr 21, 2001, 08:13 PM

I'll second that. I was interested in the Que drive, but the reviews scared me off. So I went out and picked up this beauty a couple of weeks ago. Burns like a charm! Incredibly fast, reliable and no coasters! I highly recommend the Yamaha. You won't regret it!

slimpy · Apr 22, 2001, 01:44 AM

I've heard that Yamaha's are loud. Do you find this true for your drives?
If so, what is loud - the fan(s) or drive vibration?

wumeng · Apr 22, 2001, 07:56 AM

Originally posted by slimpy:
I've heard that Yamaha's are loud. Do you find this true for your drives?
If so, what is loud - the fan(s) or drive vibration?

The Yamaha has an audible fan, but it's not as loud as a G4 minitower. When spinning at high speed (i.e. 40x reading) it can be quite loud, but this is for a fairly short period during the verification stage of disc burning.

Cipher13 · Apr 22, 2001, 08:48 AM

Nothing else on the market comes close to the Yamaha drives.
The CRW2100 and CRW8824 are unbelievably good burners, and the likes of Plextor, Que!, LaCie, and everyone else in the market should be honoured to be runners up.

Nothing compares.

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slider · Apr 22, 2001, 09:49 AM

I am recommending the Sony Spressa 1600 for the following reasons.

Not one coaster
Very Fast
Quiet even though is has a fan
Supports and even comes with Retrospect
Works with iTunes and Disc Burner
Priced fairly ($309 at Outpost as mentioned)

One thing that I would need to let you know is that the Spressa comes with Discribe burning software and not Toast. However, even Chiper would tell you, buy Toast 5. Even with those burners that come with Toast it is a limited OEM version.

Know a warning about the Que! Fire 12x10x32, it blows. The firmware update pertained to a Teac drive mechanism and yes you needed a firewire equipped PC. I had bought this drive, had headaches and coasters everywhere. Poor customer support and slow to make correction to react to the problem. Also this drives comes in different souls, could be a Plexor drive, or a samsung or a Teac. Each has their own problems. The Teac was the one with the firmware problem. I hear the Plexor drive can fail. The problem is you don't know which your getting (with the exception of the Apple Store which is a Plexor mech).

I know the Sony, which is fantastic and I have only heard good things about the Yamaha. I can say however that know matter what any Yamaha head says the Sony is no second, and in the end it might save you a few bucks. Again either is great.

DBursey · Apr 22, 2001, 11:27 AM

Yes, the Yamaha 2100 is a little on the loud side when it spins up to 40x. This is the sound of the drive mechanism. It's a very 'smooth' sound, not at all bothersome or unacceptably loud as far as I'm concerned. I'm far too enamored of the awesomely fast disk read times!

I'd buy it again in a heartbeat. You'll love this drive!

Cipher13 · Apr 22, 2001, 12:06 PM

Yeah, get Toast Deluxe, whether version 4 or 5, you really must have it.

Originally posted by slider:
I know the Sony, which is fantastic and I have only heard good things about the Yamaha. I can say however that know matter what any Yamaha head says the Sony is no second, and in the end it might save you a few bucks. Again either is great.

Hehe. The Sony is second, far far behind Yamaha.
I never proclaim anything as much as I do the Yamaha burners - they are, simply, unparalleled in every way.
Nothing deserves such proclamation as they do.
I'll never even consider buying a burner from another company, even if it was half the price and twice the speed.

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rgruber · Apr 22, 2001, 12:32 PM

Originally posted by Cipher13:
Hehe. The Sony is second, far far behind Yamaha.
I never proclaim anything as much as I do the Yamaha burners - they are, simply, unparalleled in every way.
Nothing deserves such proclamation as they do.
I'll never even consider buying a burner from another company, even if it was half the price and twice the speed.

No offense intended but I don't quite understand this. Either the thing burns disk without problems or it doesn't. How could it be so good? I mean if the Sony is quiet, it works, and it doesn't burn coasters, I really fail to see how it could be "second".

I owned a Yamaha SCSI burner for a year and a half without any problems but nothing about it was so spectacular, it's a disk burner. It worked. I'd buy another one but I'll probably by the Sony because it's cheaper, looks better and is quieter than Yamaha's offerings.

slimpy · Apr 22, 2001, 01:51 PM

I have an old 4x4x16 Yamaha - and the firmware updates have been great. What happened to the Mac updates on the CRW-2100 drives (especially the firewire model)? Are they still working on the mac version or have they stopped supporting the mac platform? Firmware updates are an important issue to me - it would be a shame if they dropped them.

OverclockedHomoSapien · Apr 23, 2001, 01:04 AM

Which Lacie drive did you have? What mechanism was in it?

It was a Plextor 8/4/32 mechanism. But the mechanism wasn't the problem, it was the firewire bridge on the drive that caused the problem. Fully the responsibility of Lacie...and how does their tech support treat me? They say rude things to me, like "if you had bought a SCSI drive then you wouldn't have this problem". I told that that if I had bought another brand I wouldn't have the problem, and that's exactly what I did. My Spressa 1600 has performed flawlessly on over 100 audio CD burns. It is not second to Yamaha...Yamaha has a faster burner at 16X, but 12X works fine for me. Since I burn many CD-R from disc to disc using my Powermac G4's internal DVD-rom drive, 12X is the fastest I can burn using this method anyways (actually 8X leaves more breathing room , but no problems so far with 12X). If Apple put faster DVD-rom drives in their towers, then 16X would be practical. 32X is getting a bit slow, I think.

Back to the topic...I swear on my mother's grave that the Spressa 1600 ROCKS! As iceing on the cake, the spressa is quiet, it's fan cycles on only when needed, and the power button is on the front. AND, it looks cool, with a nice dark blue/black color theme.

But that Lacie--ugh, I have bad dreams about Lacie and their ugly tech support. They are a bad omen, don't buy anything made by them. They also make Silverlining Pro, a Hard Drive driver that sucks the sweat off goat testies. Make no mistake, Lacie is a company that believes customers are there to be exploited.. They have no pride in their products and they hide behind a wall of lies and excuses when something goes wrong with their product. I'd buy a wintel before buying another Lacie product.

Cipher13 · Apr 23, 2001, 10:28 AM

Originally posted by rgruber:
No offense intended but I don't quite understand this. Either the thing burns disk without problems or it doesn't. How could it be so good? I mean if the Sony is quiet, it works, and it doesn't burn coasters, I really fail to see how it could be "second".

I owned a Yamaha SCSI burner for a year and a half without any problems but nothing about it was so spectacular, it's a disk burner. It worked. I'd buy another one but I'll probably by the Sony because it's cheaper, looks better and is quieter than Yamaha's offerings.

They're the most reliable, long term and short. NEVER problems. I've seen shoddy Sony burners... they're the second best you can get.
If thats what does it for ya, go and get the Sony... but if you ever have a problem, remember this conversation.

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Cipher13 · Apr 23, 2001, 10:29 AM

Originally posted by slimpy:
I have an old 4x4x16 Yamaha - and the firmware updates have been great. What happened to the Mac updates on the CRW-2100 drives (especially the firewire model)? Are they still working on the mac version or have they stopped supporting the mac platform? Firmware updates are an important issue to me - it would be a shame if they dropped them.

They support the Mac out of the box... no need for firmware updates or anything... I've never had to apply one.

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Bugs Bunny · Apr 23, 2001, 12:17 PM

They support the Mac out of the box... no need for firmware updates or anything... I've never had to apply one.

Quoted from http://www.xlr8yourmac.com

Yamaha IDE 2100 CDRW and Toast 5: -
IDE Yamaha 2100EZ (16/10/40) Beige G3, OS 9.1

"I have posted before regarding the problems using Toast and Jam with my IDE 16x lightspeed CDRW. The 5.0.1 update did not solve the sense error problem when burning audio. I have been in contact with the developers and I am now using an alpha version of Toast 5.0.2 and it solved the problem!! While my drive is now fully functional, I must recommend users choose another 16x CDRW. The Yamaha 2100EZ has a numbert of problems: it is VERY loud. I don't know how other 16x drives from other manufacturers compare regarding noise, but when the 2100EZ spins up (ie, ripping audio), it sounds like a hovercraft is taking off. The worst problem has got to be the firm ware update support, or lack of it. This kills me: Yamaha markets the 2100EZ to Mac users, and then has the gall to not release mac compatible firmware updates. The advice they give when asked how a Mac user may upgrade their IDE CDRW? Put it in a PC and run the PC firmware update. Why market to Mac users if you will not develop Mac software updates?
Michael S. "

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Ti/500/512/20
G4/533/512/40

Cipher13 · Apr 23, 2001, 09:27 PM

Well, I've taken a CRW2100, and plugged it in and used it fine.

Thats either total drivel, or he got a burner from an early batch or something.

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Hawkeye_a · Apr 27, 2001, 04:19 PM

QPS Que! FireWire drive, works great. fast(8X4X32), and compatible with iTunes and DiscBurner.

monster · May 12, 2001, 03:55 PM

my qps que!12x10x32(teac) worked great. now it doesn't. at all. qps won't help me much less return my emails. anyone that hypes a qps product just hasn't had a problem, YET. i don't care how good your product is, you're only as good as your customer support.

rambo47 · May 12, 2001, 04:11 PM

I gotta plug the Yamaha 8824. Plug and play right out of the box, supported by iToons, outstanding with Toast, reliable as can be, and never a coaster. Quiet, too.

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Email: [email protected]
iDisk: rseijas
Homepage: homepage.mac.com/rseijas

daimoni · May 14, 2001, 11:53 AM

Originally posted by rambo47:
I gotta plug the Yamaha 8824. Plug and play right out of the box, supported by iToons, outstanding with Toast, reliable as can be, and never a coaster. Quiet, too.

Tell it like it is, brotha!

We got the Yamaha 8824 for our design team who use either Pismo PowerBooks or Lombards with the FireWire2Go card. It works lovely with all of them, and I've never heard any whining about noise. All we do is fight over it... which I take to be a vote of confidence.

May 15, 2001, 12:31 AM

I'm in the same boat. I would like to buy a burner, but am still not sure what to get. What I want:
- iTunes support
- 12 or 16x
- burnproof (or equivalent)
- 700 MB CDs (800MB would be great)

This is what I have found, from my own fairly extensive research:

QPS Que - Flaky drive, flaky support. Good deal when it actually works though.
LaCie - Flaky drive, flaky support
EZQuest - Full featured drive, huge (6.8lbs and 10.5x8.5"), firewire plug and play issues (have to restart to use, crashing)
Formac - good mac company, haven't heard anything bad about the drives, decent feature set, burn-proof, bus-powered capability hard to find any real information/reviews, no iTunes support (?), quiet.
Yamaha - lots of really happy users, mac support seems to be getting worse, no burn-proof (?), no iTunes support (?), loud.
OWC - Yamaha lightspeed mechanism, no reviews, no user experiences, looks small but loud.

My questions:

Formac 16x10x40: What mechanism does this use? Is there a way of getting a PC to recognize it (good for resale and client machines)? Any real-world experiences?
Yamaha LightSpeed: Does this have iTunes support? Is Waste-Proof equivalent to burn-proof, and does it support background burning in Toast 4.1.2?
Other World Computing 16x10x40: Any information on this at all?

I hope someone can help with these questions. I am sharply divided between the Formac with burn-proof, a nice, quiet case and mac-friendliness, and the Yamaha for quality and PC compatibility.

Thanks!

Cipher13 · May 15, 2001, 03:33 AM

I'm almost positive the Yamaha lightspeed (CRW2100) supports iTunes.

Burn-Proof is just a flash phrase. I burn in the background with my CRW8424SX, and thats saying something...

I assume Waste Proof is the same, but am not sure... I wouldn't let burn proof sway your judgement. Its just something to sell products.

How is their Mac support getting worse? That is so not true. Comes with Toast OEM like all of 'em, works straight out of the box, etc... what made you say that?

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AIM: Cipher1387
ICQ: 48111606
mail: [email protected]

May 15, 2001, 11:31 PM

Hmm... Thanks for the reply Cipher.

Anyone else have any input?

Thanks,
Grant.

Bugs Bunny · May 16, 2001, 12:13 AM

Go search the Database, and see what actual users have to say.

May 16, 2001, 09:25 AM

xlr8 was one of my first stops. Unfortunately, there is only about 2 entries about the formac drive.

Your post did remind me to look up the Yamaha drive though. The main thing I found that was enlightening was that unlike burn-proof, waste-proof is just a marketing gimmick, and does not do as good a job at background burning.

Thanks!

[This message has been edited by GrantS (edited 05-16-2001).]

zigzag · May 16, 2001, 11:46 AM

The complaints about the Que drives seem to stem from the old 12x drive using the Teac mechanism, which I believe has been replaced, and you don't see the complaints much anymore. The new 16x drive uses a Plextor mechanism, the best on the market according to www.storagereview.com, and has received excellent reviews and no unusual complaints that I've seen.

Yamaha should be a good way to go as well. I've noticed that TDK is also now marketing a Mac-compatible 16x Firewire drive - might be worth looking into.

[This message has been edited by zigzag (edited 05-16-2001).]