For all UK members, I am glad to see that Amazon.co.uk does not seem to be selling any of the Emprex DVDRW drives anymore, however PC World is pushing both the 8x single layer burner and a 16x dual layer burner. I bought one of the 8x drives for £39 in PC World. I installed it and the problems started. First of all I noticed that when you placed any disk in (CD or DVD) Windows (XP Pro SP2) could see what sort of disk it was (ie CD-ROM, DVD Video etc) but would not actually read the disk. I then noticed that Windows was not sure what type of drive it was, sometimes showing t as a simple CD-ROM others as the DVDRW it actually is. I took it back to PC World and exchanged it for another. Got home and had exactly the same problem. Took it back and this time the shop insisted in testing it first (and found it would not work) so let me have the 16x model as a gesture of good will. You guessed it the same bloody thing. Finally got it chabged for an Artec 16X dual layer drive, which works fine! What I did discover is that the Emprex drives actually do work, but not under Windows XP (despite the box claiming they do) because I was able to boot up from a bootable Linux CD with the second 8X Emprex drive! Note I also discovered that other cheap burners on sale in PC World with different brand names are actually the same drive. One way to spot these is that they all come with an alternative black front as well as the standard white front. That is the one downside of my fully functional Artec drive, it is white sitting in a black and silver system! (just why are so many white/cream drives made when for the last 3 or 4 years most PCs are black and or silver?)
I've always suggested/advocated buying online anyway as you can OEM [don't have to pay for the box that way]. Plus for most U.K ppl that ask , I recommend Pioneer 109 (which is about £34:99 from www.svp.co.uk) I would steer clear of PC World / Dixons ... or any other high st shop for that matter - lol (I have bought a couple of minor peripherals @ Special Reserve < high st) Thank you for warning fellow U.K ppl that might not have known better tho wallen69 [buying Emprex DVDRW]
I hate buying online as I am to impatient and also have problems with no one at home for delivery. Also I live in N.Ireland and many companies (ie Dabs etc) charge extra for delivery, making it cheaper to buy in PC World.
i did ponder on the emprex drives way back, but there were other drives on sale that i'd actually heard of!. Nice heads up as i never did get to look into emprex more. i didn't realise the pioneer was cheap; i knew that svp do the proverbial NEC drive(s)
