It’s probably about time I actually got around to getting a DVD burner. I’ve been avoiding them for a while due to compatibility concerns and new developments and such, but it seems to have finally gotten to a point I’m comfortable with now that current burners support both + and -, R and RW. Sure, there’s talk of the dual-layer burners soon and blu-ray down the road, but there’ll probably be an initial ‘glitchy’ period while kinks are worked out that would delay things further yet. I don’t really *need* dual layer anyway; this is mostly for data backup and archival and recorded video, not copying, so I don’t care about fitting whole movies and special features and such on them. I’m glad I waited until the +/- problems were (mostly) sorted out, but I can’t wait forever…
Now I just have to decide on which burner. Sony’s are highly recommended, but expensive, and I’d also prefer one in an external enclosure with both FireWire and USB interfaces, so I can swap it around among all the systems. LaCie makes a whole bunch that fit that bill, but I haven’t heard any reviews yet. And I can always take an internal one from, say, HP and stick it in a separate enclosure.
Time for more research…
Having never used one, I can’t accurately state that LaCie’s DVD burners are all that, a bag of chips, and a bouncy, bubbly beverage; but I can say that every LaCie product I’ve ever bought or used has been of the highest quality.
From the old Mac upgrades back in the Shaw days (Centris, Quadra, and early PowerMac 8xxx & 9xxx series replacement parts all came from LaCie), up to my two current firewire LaCie babies; the 52x24x52 CDRW, and the Porsche 80GB HDD, they have all been durable and reliable.
Oh, and the blinkies on any of the Porsche line are exceedingly minimal — which I suspect might appeal to you, since your current setup at night could be mistaken for an airline runway complete with waiting emergency vehicles. ;-)