[Sirfishalot]

Got no reply to my other post. Is it worth 200 more bucks?
Is it a 1X DVD burn or 2X?

Thanks

[The Placid Casual]

I have had loads of Superdrive and non Superdrive Macs, and for me it isn't really worth the 200 Bucks. These days I always downgrade.

But,

It depends on your usage requirements.

If you do lots of DVD (iDVD, FCP work) yep it is kinda essential, and also if you do loads and loads of backups it can be useful...

However for general computing I bought a huge External HDD for less money than the SD, and it suits my needs better.

In 2 years of having a superdrive I burned about 6 DVDs...

But I guess it is a totally personal decision and everyone is different.

Peace,

Marc

[cambro]

Yeah....

I have a Ghz Ti book...with a combo drive. It saved $200 at the time, so it's all good, but it would have probably been worth while just to add it to the up-front cost for these reasons:

1) Resale value...not sure it is $200, but probably really close.

2) iPhoto archiving. DVDs really shine in this department.

3) Archiving. Ok, rarely done, but when done, 1 disk will go a long way and make things easier.

So, it is definitely up in the air and depends on your use. For me, 1 and 2 make me wish I would have just gone SD.

[EvanV]

I don't have my PowerBook yet but I have 2 other DVD burners on my Intel 2.8 GHz and I have made close to 100 DVD's in less than 3 months.

[mism]

are you going to use it for:

A) creating and burning your own DVDs?

B) backing up / archiving lots of stuff?

if its yes to both of these questions then get it.

I use mine for both and would hate to be without it. Backing up my mp3 collection to 4 DVDs is a lot easier than to 20 CDs. Once you are used to the capacity of DVDs you wont want to be constrained by CDs again.

[NYCFarmboy]

If you don't do any digital photography/movies and don't bother with doing large backups then you don't need the DVD burner in my opinion.

HOWEVER... If you do any type of photography or home movies the joy and ease of using imovie makes burning a DVD an awesome and easy thing to do.

I would never ever buy another computer again that did not burn DVDs.

However if you only use your mac for email/web surfing/word processing then a DVD burner would not be of much use.

I believe the new powerbooks are all 2x burners, but I'm not sure.

[Eug]

The new PowerBooks use the UJ-816 and are capable of 2X DVD-R. (Actually so is my UJ-815 in my TiBook, with a firmware update.)

BTW, the only way to do a 1:1 backup of the software install disc is with a DVD-R burner, for obvious reasons.

[Kelvin]

iDVD doesn't work with external burners does it?

I was wondering if you don't do too many DVDs then you could always get a FW DVD external burner later. I little more expensive than the internal.

However, if you are doing movies and you also get an external FW harddrive for movie storage how do you manage all this with 1 FW port on the 12"? Let's say I've got a FW DV camcorder, an external FW HD and external FW DVD burner. Can you daisychain all this equipment up? Connect the camera to the end devices, import the movie to the external FW harddrive, edit it, then burn to the external DVD burner without any issues?

I guess that might be one advantage with the 15" having two FW ports.

Thanks

[Sirfishalot]

Appreciate it. I went ahead and changed my order to include the Superdrive. I am into digital photo and have some inkling to dable in video, so I figure it will be worth a couple more hundred.
Anyway, I said to myself early on that if I was going to spend that kind of money on a computer it better have Superdrive.

[Liquidity X]

I got one this summe rin my G4, burned DVDs for all my buddy of movies that whernt out yet on dvd that I had "aquired", charged a few extra bucks than media cost me, and i paided off my burner in a
week

[slider]

I opted out of the superdrive to save the $200. I have a 867 QS which has a SD, so if I need to burn something I can. I've also only burned a handful of DVD's. I would think that if you need to ask if you need a sd, you probably don't.

[macndave]

Originally posted by Sirfishalot:
Got no reply to my other post. Is it worth 200 more bucks?
Is it a 1X DVD burn or 2X?

Thanks

If you are able to afford the additional $200, I would recommend that you purchase the SuperDrive. I am of the opinion that over time computer users grow into the capacity (filing hard drives, wishing for more speed and RAM) of the computers, especially Mac users. Though you may not have an interest in making DVDs today, that might change in the future (given the intergration of the iLife apps).

Also, as others have mentioned the ability to backup 4+ gigs of data on DVD vs 700 megs on CD is very nice. Finally, I think it would add to the re-sale value of your PowerBook. In the resale market, people want "more" for their money than those who purchase retail. So "add-ons" like a SuperDrive gain more attention and higher bids, IMHO.

[Eug]

Originally posted by Liquidity X:
I got one this summe rin my G4, burned DVDs for all my buddy of movies that whernt out yet on dvd that I had "aquired", charged a few extra bucks than media cost me, and i paided off my burner in a
week

IOW, Liquidity X says, "Look, I'm a true pirate! Arr-matey, not only do I pirate stuff for my own use, I make money selling it too!"