BenQ DW800A DVD+RW

The falling cost of blank DVDs is posing a threat to CD-R, especially when you consider that a DVD can hold seven times as much data as a CD. Also, recordable DVD drives have reduced in price and have increased in writing speed, which makes them a serious option over CD-RW drives.

The BenQ DW800A DVD+RW comes with all the necessary cables and a set-up poster, which makes installation simple. The supplied DVD recording software is RecordNow! from Sonic. It's straightforward and can be used to create music CDs as well as data DVDs. Because of their size - 4.7Gb - DVDs are a sensible media option for backing up files. Thankfully, RecordNow! has a feature for archiving valuable files. There's also another utility called Q-Video, which can transfer video from a camcorder directly onto CD or DVD in one click.[ Our tests found the DW800A to be a very fast drive. Writing to a full DVD+R took only eight minutes and 14 mins when writing to a DVD+RW. At these speeds, there's no excuse not to back up your work regularly.

Although the DW800A doesn't support -R/RW media, it's well-priced and comes with some good software.

Contact: BenQ 01442 301000
www.benq.co.uk