[thegelding]

next door neighbor has an older G4 tower...don't know all the specs (he is still running 0s 9.1, but i have talked him into updating to X)...anyways, he has a digital camcorder and wants to make iMovies and then burn them into DVDs

so he needs an external dvd burner

what is the best external dvd burner...and do any work with iDVD?

thanks for the info

g

[Luca]

It's cheaper and more convenient to get an internal drive. You could probably install it yourself... in fact, even a computer-illiterate neighbor probably could (well, maybe not, but it's not THAT hard). Go to NewEgg and pick up a Pioneer DVR-107D drive. It's $84, with free shipping. There are cheaper DVD burners available, but the Pioneer is natively supported in OS X, versions 10.3.3 and later (earlier versions won't work with the iApps and such because they came out before the drive was introduced).

So, once you have the drive, it's a pretty simple manner of opening the case, taking out the old drive, and putting in the new one. If you need any help, XLR8YourMac.com has an illustrated drive installation guide you can use.

An internal drive will provide so many benefits. It's cheaper because you don't have to buy the Firewire case. You can get even more money back by selling the old drive. Although there are ways to get iDVD to work with an external DVD burner, it'll work right off the bat with an internal. Plus, the new drive is probably faster than the current one, so everyday tasks like reading CDs will move more quickly.

[thegelding]

thanks

a very quick and complete reply...

gotta find out his exact system...just took a glance at it...pre mirror front windtunnel model...

g

[FFL]

The Pioneer DVR-107D is a great drive and newegg is the best place to buy it. However, it is not supported by the standard DVD burning drivers in 9.1 (actually it should be updated to 9.2.2).

The drive is supported fine in OS 10.3, but 9 was last updated long before this drive shipped.

Fortunately, you can find "hacked" drivers for it in the forums at XLR8YourMac.com.

Been there, done that - those hacked drivers saved me some potential embarassment after recommending it for a client still booting his G4 tower on OS 9.

[usurp]

how do i know if a DVD writer works on a mac? i always thought Lacie had the cheapest dvd writers coming in a 128$ on amazon for an internal. didnt even think pioneer had a mac compatible version. 84$ is really cheap...

[FFL]

Originally Posted by usurp how do i know if a DVD writer works on a mac? i always thought Lacie had the cheapest dvd writers coming in a 128$ on amazon for an internal. didnt even think pioneer had a mac compatible version. 84$ is really cheap...

LaCies are almost universally unsupported for Mac DVD (their CD burners work great though).

I wouldn't go with anything but a Pioneer DVD burner for best Mac compatibility. Most of the SuperDrives that Apple has shipped have been Pioneer drives.

[Luca]

Anything over $100 for a DVD burner is way too expensive. The only one I know of that can justify its high price (and even then, only somewhat) is the Plextor 12x burner, which will burn DVD+R at 12x (it still burns DVD-R at 8x).

$84 is actually somewhat high for a typical DVD burner. That's what the Pioneer DVR-107D costs. It's $63 for an NEC 8x burner, and $76 for a dual-layer version of the NEC. The only thing is that the NEC isn't natively supported on a Mac.

It's easy to look at the specifications and get excited over features that really aren't useful yet. For example, although I have the Pioneer 8x DVD burner, I haven't bought any 8x media for it because it's too expensive. I just get by with 4x media. Also, there are a bunch of dual-layer burners out now, but they only burn dual layer discs in DVD+R format, and they only burn them at 2.4x. It takes about 15 minutes to burn a single-layer disc at 4x, so it would take 50 minutes to burn a dual layer disc at 2.4x. That's a really, REALLY long time.

I'd say if your neighbor wants to stay up to date, he should just upgrade to 10.3 and get the DVR-107D. NewEgg doesn't even carry the DVR-106 anymore, so you would have to overspend on one at eBay or something if you wanted a drive that is supported in earlier versions of the Mac OS. It's better to just get the 107 and use the hacked drivers if he doesn't get 10.3.

[usurp]

believe it or not all i was looking for was a combo drive. my current mac at home has a lousy 8x cdwriter and doesnt read dvds. i wanted a drive that was atleast a 24x writer and could read dvds and couldnt find any. so i decided to look for a dvd writer and from what i just read now good thing amazon ran out of the lacies cuz i was planning to buy it a few days ago!!

[Luca]

Yeah, usurp, you gotta go to NewEgg. They're a generic computer parts store, so while they do sell PC-specific components (motherboards, processors, etc), they also sell optical drives, hard drives, RAM, monitors, all that good stuff that works in both PCs and Macs. By the way, you can go with the DVD burner if you want, but they also have a number of Combo drives there. The main issue is finding a Combo drive that is fully compatible with OS X - most of them are not. So unless you're getting the known-good DVR-107D, you should probably go to www.xlr8yourmac.com and click on the "Drive Compatibility Database" link. It has a huge listing of optical drives and reports on whether they work in OS X natively, with a hack, or not at all.

PS. I just checked the database and it seems as though there aren't a whole lot of natively compatible drives. However, if you download the "Patchburn II" utility for Panther, you can get support for many drives. One that seems to work particularly well with Patchburn II is the LG GCC-4521B. The earlier version of that drive, the LG GCC-4480B, is natively supported without any need for additional software. The fully supported ones are $40 on eBay - do a search for "GCC-4480B" and make sure to check the box that says to search titles and descriptions.

[usurp]

wow man that was really helpful. first day in this forum and already learned something new.

the coolest thing is LG drives are flooded here in the market and they go very really cheap. I live in Kuwait btw.. so this weekend i am gonna go and check out the drives. I am soo excited now :>

[Luca]

Ah darn. I didn't know you were from Kuwait, otherwise I wouldn't have referred you to NewEgg - they only ship to the US or US territories. Anyway, it sounds like you can obtain one of those drives from a different source anyway. There are plenty of places other than NewEgg, it just happens to be one of the best.

Good luck with it. Sounds like you know what to look for now.

[usurp]

its not an issue, i have an US forwarding mailbox. thats how i get all my tech from amazon. once an item arrives to my mailbox in the states, 2 days later i get it here.