Optical Disc Drive owners club

[mplayerMuPDF]

Interesting thread & nice to see interest in optical disk storage solutions. I still have about 10 CD/DVD players around my place, some old, some not so old. All designed to fit into computer cases of course but still have a media player in my lounge room that uses optical disk playback for blue ray & standard discs that I still use regularly.
One thing for sure though, with longevity of data storage, optical disk is still it. I have a TDK CD data disc from about 20 yrs ago that still holds all its data accurately like the day it was recorded.
Here's a quick screenshot of one of the Asus units I still have in a system here that I'm typing this from ...

View attachment 263009

That would be a rebadged LG GH24NSC0 or GH24NSD0 or GH24NSD1, according to the Hitachi-LG optical drives table.

Am I the only one that stock piles optical drives?? Lol got more in a box somewhere round here...

View attachment 263077

I must confess I am an aspiring stockpiler... The first thing I want to change about my PC is the case. I want to get a big old ATX case with 2 5.25" bays, so I can have more usable optical drives (and not having to reliable on USB adapters is not a bad thing either with the continuing USB issues of my X470 chipset).

 

[mechtech]

I still have an old stack of Taiyo Yuden's lying around...................poor things sitting there collecting dust.

 

[QuietBob]

Sign me up!
Pretty much every PC in my possession has an internal ODD, including my main rig with a 5800X3D

I mostly rip audio CDs and watch the occasional DVD/BR flick. On retro systems I use the optical drive to install old games and rip music from them. It also comes in handy when an older machine refuses to install the OS from a USB stick.

 

[Canned Noodles]

I got this pc for $20 off of Craigslist listed as non-working. I can’t figure out which specific part(s) are not working but it’s a windows 98/xp-era machine. Sometimes I wonder why the previous owner had 4 CD drives put in. They are all high speed according to front plates, and each one is connected to the same IDE cable.

 

[mplayerMuPDF]

I got this pc for $20 off of Craigslist listed as non-working. I can’t figure out which specific part(s) are not working but it’s a windows 98/xp-era machine. Sometimes I wonder why the previous owner had 4 CD drives put in. They are all high speed according to front plates, and each one is connected to the same IDE cable.

I don't know much about ATA/IDE but I think IDE devices are supposed to be chained. You may have bought some former bootlegger's old rig (you know the guy who was always burning copies of pirated stuff for family, friends and acquaintances). Of course, it could have been a legit operation as well technically but I don't know who would be burning so much homemade, licensed or legally purchased content but not have a duplicator.

 

[QuietBob]

I got this pc for $20 off of Craigslist listed as non-working. I can’t figure out which specific part(s) are not working but it’s a windows 98/xp-era machine. Sometimes I wonder why the previous owner had 4 CD drives put in. They are all high speed according to front plates, and each one is connected to the same IDE cable.

It definitely needs another 3.5" floppy drive

 

[80-watt Hamster]

Am I the only one that stock piles optical drives?? Lol got more in a box somewhere round here...

View attachment 263077

Nope.

 

[erocker]

I got a newer slim USB 3.0 for a few older games and whatever I find on disk when I need it. I tend to maily use it for playing Freelancer and its mods. There's quite a few games from the early to mid 2000's that you can't get digitally other than through torrents and a lot of those are just no good/don't work etc.

 

[Deleted member 185158]

Nope.

View attachment 263140

I love that memorex drive. One of the fastest out there! Looks like the same one I gots!

 

[80-watt Hamster]

I love that memorex drive. One of the fastest out there! Looks like the same one I gots!

I don't know that I've ever used it, and will have to share the model number to see if you're right. Most of the drives in that box are salvaged from, well, salvaged machines. Mix of IDA and SATA, mostly SATA at this point. Mortality has taken a toll on the collection, and the usefulness of IDE-connected drives is... low these days.

Most boxen have a HLDS GH-70N. A ways back I needed a replacement drive, and was looking for one with a plain black bezel. Found a lot of about ten on eBay for less than $8/ea. Are they good? I dunno; use is limited to bootable diagnostics, ripping the occasional audio disc and infrequent long-term backups. At least two have gone south; two or three remain in reserve.

 

[mplayerMuPDF]

I don't know that I've ever used it, and will have to share the model number to see if you're right. Most of the drives in that box are salvaged from, well, salvaged machines. Mix of IDA and SATA, mostly SATA at this point. Mortality has taken a toll on the collection, and the usefulness of IDE-connected drives is... low these days.

Most boxen have a HLDS GH-70N. A ways back I needed a replacement drive, and was looking for one with a plain black bezel. Found a lot of about ten on eBay for less than $8/ea. Are they good? I dunno; use is limited to bootable diagnostics, ripping the occasional audio disc and infrequent long-term backups. At least two have gone south; two or three remain in reserve.

That sounds like an older LG drive, from back when they were still built pretty well. Old LG drives can also have a Renesas chipset. I remember people saying on Myce forums that those were better burners than the later Mediatek-based drives. On the other hand Mediatek chipsets are better for ripping. I cannot find it in the HL optical drive table but I do see the GH-60N and GH-80N, which indeed are both Renesas chipset based drives. Overall they should be pretty decent drives, significantly better than the majority of what is sold today certainly.

 

[Sombreuil]

Just finished buying all the components for a new build, and the PC case is a Pure Base 600 because I still want to use my optical drive (LG CH12NS30). I bought it second-hand many years ago and it's still working like a charm.
What puzzles me the most nowadays is that, motherboard manufacturers still provide a DVD for the drivers, but pretty much any PC case has no 3.5 slot. Go figure.

 

[Dr. Dro]

If you have the space then these should last you for quite a while: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/223449200168 and they are great drives.

I've got a whole bag of those Samsung drives in my shed, none of them work, same problem, the motor just went poof

Regarding the Optiarc's, I found a listing for the AD-7240S drive (July 2009 manufacture) for 30 bucks (so like, $6) here, and they seem to be in quite good condition, and apparently they've got two of them. You've got me tempted... I don't think I ever owned a reliable optical drive before. I'll make an offer and see if they take 50 for both of them I suppose.

 

[mplayerMuPDF]

I've got a whole bag of those Samsung drives in my shed, none of them work, same problem, the motor just went poof

Regarding the Optiarc's, I found a listing for the AD-7240S drive (July 2009 manufacture) for 30 bucks (so like, $6) here, and they seem to be in quite good condition, and apparently they've got two of them. You've got me tempted... I don't think I ever owned a reliable optical drive before. I'll make an offer and see if they take 50 for both of them I suppose.

Those are great drives. If they are in good condition, I would definitely get them. Excellent burners and well built. $10 USD is absolutely peanuts for 2 of those. You can find them sold rebadged as Lite-On iHAS x24 Y series as well.

 

[delshay]

I got this pc for $20 off of Craigslist listed as non-working. I can’t figure out which specific part(s) are not working but it’s a windows 98/xp-era machine. Sometimes I wonder why the previous owner had 4 CD drives put in. They are all high speed according to front plates, and each one is connected to the same IDE cable.

I think some very old games came on multiple CD. To save time just install each CD in a drive.

 

[BSim500]

I use my BD-RE all the time for DVD's & Blu-Ray. For all the gushing hype about how "streaming will take over the world", in reality Netflix & Amazon Prime combined have barely 5-10% of the total catalogue size available on DVD. If your taste in movies is somewhat wider than the thin-slice of content they get (and rapidly "cycle out" for 'rights issues' just as quickly, often whilst you're in the middle of a series...), there simply is no replacement for optical.

Also classic PC games - I have Diablo 2, Freelancer, No One Lives Forever 1-2, Outrun 2006, Prey (2006), The Neverhood, etc, and dozens more on disc that aren't available to buy digitally anywhere. 'Digital' Steam-like stores haven't (and quite possibly never will) 100% replace everything 1:1 that was released prior to the mid-2000's transition, and even GOG has large "holes" in their catalogue of some seriously good titles.

 

[Dr. Dro]

I use my BD-RE all the time for DVD's & Blu-Ray. For all the gushing hype about how "streaming will take over the world", in reality Netflix & Amazon Prime combined have barely 5-10% of the total catalogue size available on DVD. If your taste in movies is somewhat wider than the thin-slice of content they get (and rapidly "cycle out" for 'rights issues' just as quickly, often whilst you're in the middle of a series...), there simply is no replacement for optical.

Also classic PC games - I have Diablo 2, Freelancer, No One Lives Forever 1-2, Outrun 2006, Prey (2006), The Neverhood, etc, and dozens more on disc that aren't available to buy digitally anywhere. 'Digital' Steam-like stores haven't (and quite possibly never will) 100% replace everything 1:1 that was released prior to the mid-2000's transition, and even GOG has large "holes" in their catalogue of some seriously good titles.

I personally like audio CDs. I've all but embraced digital media at this point when it comes to games and for the most part, movies, but I have a very soft spot for high-resolution audio, and nothing beats optical media mastered from source at it. I order some audio CDs and SACDs from Japan every now and then, it's a very big thing there to this day, and I'm glad it is.

Those are great drives. If they are in good condition, I would definitely get them. Excellent burners and well built. $10 USD is absolutely peanuts for 2 of those. You can find them sold rebadged as Lite-On iHAS x24 Y series as well.

I made the offer for the Optiarc drives, just waiting on the seller's answer now. I'll let you know if there's a deal, and if they're alright when they arrive. It's a risk worth taking

So, a little update: the seller accepted and I've purchased the drives. Will bring some results on ripping and burning once I have them in hand.

 

[P4-630]

I might buy an external dvd-cd-rom rw drive in the near future, doesn't have to be expensive.

 

[Bones]

Have two BR units in this one I'm posting with, one is a CD/DVD/BR burner (LG M-disc), the other a more standard CD/DVD burner unit (Also LG) but it too can read BR.

Have several out at the shack including an Asus CD/DVD "Lightscribe" IDE and a few others for good measure I've accumilated over the years.

I don't know much about ATA/IDE but I think IDE devices are supposed to be chained. You may have bought some former bootlegger's old rig (you know the guy who was always burning copies of pirated stuff for family, friends and acquaintances). Of course, it could have been a legit operation as well technically but I don't know who would be burning so much homemade, licensed or legally purchased content but not have a duplicator.

You're referring to "Master" and Slave" drives on the same IDE ribbon cable.

You can have two IDE devices on the same cable and you have a jumper on these drives to set them as such according to how you have them plugged into the cable, this goes for both, disc drives and HDD's.
Yes, you can have one of each on the same cable as long as you have the jumpers set correctly. There is a little diagram on the end of the drive that tells you how to set these jumpers.
For an HDD, alot of the time it's on the drive's label but for disc drives it's always stamped into the metal at the end where the jumper is.

For those that don't know, It goes like this:
Each IDE cable have three plugs total, what I call the "Long" and "Short" ends of the cable is based on how close to the middle plug each end is.

The board end plug is the "Long" end of the cable and is on one end of it, that always goes to the board itself and is further away from the middle plug.

The drive plugs are always towards the "Short" end of the cable.

The master drive plug on it is always at the very end of the ribbon cable too like the board end is and the master end is always closer to the middle (Slave) plug than the board end is.
Once you look at an IDE cable, you can lay it out and easily see this layout for yourself.

Usually there are labels saying what each plug is for is but that's how you can tell if there are no labels for these plugs on the cable.

 

[Canned Noodles]

I personally like audio CDs. I've all but embraced digital media at this point when it comes to games and for the most part, movies, but I have a very soft spot for high-resolution audio, and nothing beats optical media mastered from source at it. I order some audio CDs and SACDs from Japan every now and then, it's a very big thing there to this day, and I'm glad it is.

My father bought a Playstation 3 with modded firmware used to rip SA-CDs. It's the latest fat model, and I assume that's because you need the media card interface on the front to transfer the music to store the ripped CDs. I haven't tried ripping any SA-CDs, but I do have a Johnny Cash SA-CD I can try it with.

 

[A Computer Guy]

Good post, let's bring optical drives back!

MODGA = Make Optical Disks Great Again

 

[P4-630]

MODGA = Make Optical Disks Great Again

Make Optical Drives Great Again.

 

[A Computer Guy]

Am I the only one that stock piles optical drives?? Lol got more in a box somewhere round here...

View attachment 263077

I recently got a stockpile of 6 DVD drives as my company was sending off old machines for recycling. Stuck all of them in my Antec 1200 to prepare for Plex winter weekends.

 

[Deleted member 185158]

I recently got a stockpile of 6 DVD drives as my company was sending off old machines for recycling. Stuck all of them in my Antec 1200 to prepare for Plex winter weekends.

That's a big case. My brother had that one, mine the 900. I also have and use the larger psus that fit your case, the Antec CP series. Good stuff!

 

[A Computer Guy]

That's a big case. My brother had that one, mine the 900. I also have and use the larger psus that fit your case, the Antec CP series. Good stuff!

On top of the 6 DVD's I managed to snatch up I had 2 already. It makes a beautiful sound when all 8 are ripping at once and my wife is like "Do you have to do that right now?"