Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!usc!apple!limbo!taylor From: taylor@limbo.Intuitive.Com (Dave Taylor) Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.misc Subject: Re: CD-ROM drive question Message-ID: <1058@limbo.Intuitive.Com> Date: 3 Aug 90 16:51:35 GMT References: <1990Aug2.010634.28099@cbnews.att.com> Reply-To: taylor@limbo.Intuitive.Com (Dave Taylor) Distribution: na Organization: Intuitive Systems, Mountain View, CA: +1 (415) 966-1151 Lines: 72 [The following is an excerpt from an article I wrote for Computer Currents magazine. This information is not, of course, complete, but should be some useful fuel for the fire, as it were. -- Dave] -------- ... Which CD-ROM Drive To Get (C) Copyright 1990 Dave Taylor. All Rights Reserved. Before we look at the wealth of information available on CD-ROM, let's have a quick check into what companies offer CD-ROM units, and what kind of price you can expect to pay for them. The first and foremost company is Apple themselves, with the newly redesigned CD-SC CD-ROM player. The current, recently lowered price for the unit is under $1000 retail, with the best advertised price approximately $800 or so. The unit was redesigned, by the way, because the older models were prone to collecting dust on the optical lens (through which a laser shines and records reflections, the fundamental CD technology). Average seek time on the Apple CD-SC is 600 milliseconds. Next in line is the DRD-253 from Denon, a company that has long been known for their fine audiophile equipment. This unit has an average access time of 350 milliseconds, supports audio straight off the disc, and even has a built in audio speaker so you can use it just like a little audio CD player. The DRD-253 configured for a Macintosh to hook up to the SCSI port is $829 complete. NEC Electronics also offers a couple of different CD-ROM players for the Macintosh environment. The portable CDR-35 kit is clocked at a slow 1500 millisecond average seek time, but is quite totable at almost the same size as the small Sony D-7 audio CD unit. NEC also makes a larger desktop unit that features the same color scheme as the Macintosh itself, the CDR-77, and about three times the performance of their portable unit, with an average seek time of 500 milliseconds. Pricing is $599 for the portable unit and $749 for the desktop model. Toshiba also has a pair of CD-ROM drives available for the Macintosh, with one priced amazingly low at under $700. The lower priced unit is the XM-5100A and it features 380 millisecond seek time and front panel audio output and volume control. The small profile desktop XM-3201A is slightly faster at 350 millisecond average seek time. Pricing on both are: $699 for the XM-5100A and $799 for the XM-3201A unit. This is not an exhaustive list of what drives are available for the Macintosh. Also, the prices should be used as indicators, not as suggested retail; a quick glance through some adverts in the latest issue of MacWorld indicated prices that while for the most part were similar to the above, had the NEC portable for $399, and the Toshiba XM-3201A unit for $899 (in the same advert). Shop around once you've decided on a particular drive. Note that with the exception of the Apple drive, all the drives mentioned here can easily be used on a PC too, thereby making them perhaps an even wiser investment for a mixed computer office or work environment. On the down side, they all require that you use a rather awkward CD disc caddy; a small plastic disc holder that requires some fiddling to open typically. For reasons that we can't fathom, all the CD-ROM drive makers have decided that the ease of disc swapping in an audio CD drive isn't appropriate for the presumably more delicate CD-ROM discs. Spare disc caddy's, which seem to be identical for all vendors, are about $12 each. -------- Hope that's a help! -- Dave Taylor Intuitive Systems Mountain View, California taylor@limbo.intuitive.com or {uunet!}{decwrl,apple}!limbo!taylor