Optical Drives - The Future

[Plod2151]

I'm looking to build my next PC in about 6 months so I'm starting to save now. My question is this. There are blue ray writers out there but I can't find any HD readers or writers to buy OEM. Are they coming? Also are they likely to have SATA connections like some DVD drives or will they stay IDE.
What's the advantages of SATA optical drives over IDE drives apart from the obvious no massive cable?

[kalniel]

No other advantages.

HD writers will be coming, yes. Probably have both SATA and IDE connections.

[Clunk]

The cable issue aside, I found the main advantage to be that I was able to disable the Jmicron controller in the bios

[Agent]

Each SATA is its own channel, IDE doesnt.
You dont want 2 optical drives on one IDE cable / channel as it can only talk to one of them at a time.
SATA doesnt have this limitation (granted, you can only connect 1 device to one port)

[Plod2151]

OK so SATA does have that advantage. Is it also quicker than IDE? Also my PC is somewhat aging now and to get SATA to work as an OS I have to install the SATA drivers from a floppy disc. Is this still a requirement or do motherboards now just work with formatted SATA drives

[Clunk]

No speed difference, although, as I mentioned earlier, the IDE is on the jmicron controller on my motherboard and it is quite slow to react to things.

[Plod2151]

How long before we start seeing HD readers or even blue ray readers as commonplace in PC's?
My reason behind this thread is I'm planning to make a HTPC that is fully HD capable and will be able to watch HD and DVD movies in the future

[IAmATeaf]

How long before we start seeing HD readers or even blue ray readers as commonplace in PC's?
My reason behind this thread is I'm planning to make a HTPC that is fully HD capable and will be able to watch HD and DVD movies in the future

Probably in another year or 2 before prices come down to a level that most people can afford, the price to some extent is also tied to the price of blank media.

[IAmATeaf]

Each SATA is its own channel, IDE doesnt.
You dont want 2 optical drives on one IDE cable / channel as it can only talk to one of them at a time.
SATA doesnt have this limitation (granted, you can only connect 1 device to one port)

I've never had any problems having a master and slave writer connected to the same IDE channel, as you point out to get to the slave writer the OS effectively has to ask the master but I've done DVD copies direct from the slave to the master no probs.

[badass]

When it comes to optical drives I have a rule of thumb: Only buy once the drives are less than £100
That way you get a pretty modern high capacity device and dont cry at the depreciation. After they hit sub £100, the price cuts slow down a lot. I think a winner will have emerged by then aswell

[simonfitba]

When it comes to optical drives I have a rule of thumb: Only buy once the drives are less than £100
That way you get a pretty modern high capacity device and dont cry at the depreciation. After they hit sub £100, the price cuts slow down a lot. I think a winner will have emerged by then aswell

You read my mind. I reckon HD-DVD will win too. Something I read to do with pron.

[Agent]

I've never had any problems having a master and slave writer connected to the same IDE channel, as you point out to get to the slave writer the OS effectively has to ask the master but I've done DVD copies direct from the slave to the master no probs.

Oh it'll work fine, it'll just be slow
Doing disks "on the fly" from one writer to another, on the same chanel is madness
You can see it read from the other, pause, the other write, pause, then back to the first one.
IDE can *not* talk to both of them at the same time. Its simply not part of its specification.
If you have the choice between 4IDE ports or an extra 4 SATA ones, id go with SATA everytime. Even though my opticals are IDE, a SerialO-2 does the job nicely

[IAmATeaf]

Oh it'll work fine, it'll just be slow
Doing disks "on the fly" from one writer to another, on the same chanel is madness
You can see it read from the other, pause, the other write, pause, then back to the first one.
IDE can *not* talk to both of them at the same time. Its simply not part of its specification.
If you have the choice between 4IDE ports or an extra 4 SATA ones, id go with SATA everytime. Even though my opticals are IDE, a SerialO-2 does the job nicely

I see and understand what you're saying, all I'm saying is works for me no probs

[DanceswithUnix]

Have never seen this pausing in action, perhaps because I am using Linux. Still, modern DVD drives have large enough buffers and all that buffer underrun protection that it should be able to stream. Perhaps with CD drives it wouldn't be so hot.

[shaithis]

It seems as if Toshiba are dragging their heals with HD-DVD writers. Not sure when they are going to release, in fact you can't even buy a reader unless its the XBox360 USB drive or you take the drive from a £500 set-top box (they do fit and work).

I also thought that HD-DVD was going to win the war but Toshiba have done an unbelievably great job of not keeping the momentum rolling and have let Sony catch-up.....in fact I think Sony is about to waltz right past them unless they do something fast.......Unfortunately Toshiba don't seem to understand that...

Plus the whole "HD medium" future seems to currently be on hold due to both HD-DVD and BluRay protection being made null and void in the last few weeks......Studios have put most releases on hold