Lacie Studiodrive/Plextor PX-W4012TU

Aren't external CD writers slow and awkward to use? Not any more, or at least not as long as you have a recent PC with USB2. This standard makes it a doddle to install external devices and gives you the performance of an internal drive. Another benefit of USB2 for Windows XP users is that most external devices just plug in and work without you having to install any drivers.

USB2 offers excellent performance and both the Lacie Studiodrive 40x 12x 48x USB2 and the Plextor PX-W4012TU are top of the range. Both boast a 40-speed write and 12-speed rewrite, but the Lacie is the faster reader at 48-speed. Plextor's offering is wrapped in a plastic and aluminium case, while Lacie's drive is in fact made by Lite-On and encased inside a blue/purple box.

We tested both drives for writing, rewriting and reading capabilities.

Our first write test consists of a straight disc-to-disc copy of the 624MB cover disc from PCW's August issue. The Plextor drive took three minutes 25 seconds, but the Lacie was six seconds faster. The second write test consists of burning a 687MB mpeg-4 file. The Plextor drive completed this in three minutes 34 seconds, just pipped at the post by Lacie's three minutes 22 seconds. Writing the same content to a CD-RW took quite a bit longer than to CD-R, with the Plextor finishing in six minutes 53 seconds and the Lacie three seconds faster.

To test the drives' ability to drag and drop files onto CD-RW, we used a 505MB chunk of raw data. This took the Plextor eight minutes 40 seconds, while the Lacie did it in 10 minutes 48 seconds. When we tested read performance, the Lacie was slightly faster than the Plextor.

Overall, these two drives are very similar in both performance and price, but the Plextor is slightly cheaper.

SPECIFICATIONS:
Lacie:

• 40x 12x 48x CD-RW drive
• EasyCD Creator 5
• USB2 connection

Plextor:

• 40x 12x 40x CD-RW drive
• Nero 5
• USB2 connection

DETAILS
Lacie Studiodrive 40x 12x 48x USB2
Price: £220.89 (£188 ex VAT)
Contact: www.lacie.com

Plextor PX-W4012TU
Price: £176.25 (£150 ex VAT)
Contact: www.plextor.be