CD/DVD Combo or CD & DVD seperate

[Enigmatic]

What are peoples personal opinions on this ?

I don't know whether to get a combo CD/DVD or just get them both seperately.

What you people think ?

Thanks.

[Dougal]

If you do a lot of Disc copying the seperate is better,

But there have been reports from my friends that the single units don't last as long but they prefer them

[herulach]

I like to have mine seperate, but i never ever use my cd drive, except when doing multi disk installs.

[rajindergill]

given the prices of DVD writers (£28). I would suggest just going for a DVD writer or two.

[kevpuk]

I say separate - also can consider 2 DVD writers as rajindergill says
Maybe a little overkill, but I have the LG for DVD-RAM etc and the HP for funky lightscribe stuff........

[eloquence]

I'd say that if you have the space in your machine for them and aren't hugely tight on your budget, go for a DVD Reader, and a DVD Writer, or 2 DVD Writers, as this is better for multi-disc installs and direct disc-to-disc copies. Amazon has a PikaOne DVD Writer for £20 currently, so 2 writers would only cost you £40.
CDRW/DVD combo drives are really on their way out - there's only a couple of pounds difference to pick up a DVD Writer. You save so little money picking up a combo instead of a DVD writer, that it's not worthwhile compared to if and when you want to back up your files or whatever, and realise you'd be better off with a DVD Writer.

[Spunkey]

Separate, always separate.

You wouldnt buy a 42" plasma with an inbuilt VCR would you

[kevpuk]

Wow, where can I get me one of those new fangled 42" with built-in VCR

Guess that makes me a Twonk

Seriously, though, 2 drives is all about extra flexibility and minimal downtime (should on ever go £%^* up !

[Rave]

If you install your 'reader' drive (be it a plain DVD-Rom, combo, DVDRW or whatever) on a different IDE channel to the writer you can do fast on-the-fly copies- which is nice. If that means it ends up on the same channel as your hard disk, don't worry- it won't slow it down (unless you're reading from that drive onto the hard disk).

As for what to get, it depends what you're going to do really. If burning two discs at the same time sounds good then get a combo or DVD-RW, otherwise just get a DVD-Rom drive like I did.

[junglejim]

For me it depends on usage... alot of people don't do disk to disk copying so a dvd writer on its own would do then with the £20 saved you could put it towards more ram or something,

JB

[Fatboy]

I've got a DVDRW and DVD/CDRW for best flexibility (and to save my brain from recalling which one I can put DVD's into...), a two drive solution is the way to go tho.