CD-ROM Drive Failures

[Rich]

Has anyone out there had problems with their AOpen CD-ROM drives? I am mainly refering to the drive belts snapping and rendering them useless. I am interested to know if others are having similar problems. I am also curious how other manufacturers drives hold up too.

Thanks

[Kurtis]

haven't used any AOpen CD drives, sorry

[ELiTE KiLLaH]

ya me iether
ive used a few creative 52x aka loud mofo's though lol

is this a widespread problem? (or is that what you are tryin to findout?)

liteon ive used many times, always good
plextor used to be the king ....but now most think its just too expensive so they opt for liteons, which are damn nice drives...cheap too
sony, ive come across sometimes...also good afaik
samsung are ncie as well....have one for over 3 yrs, and still no sign of dying

[Rich]

Most of the drive failures I have seen are cause by the use of a rubber band drive rather than a gear drive for the CD tray movement. I just picked up a Samsung which uses the gear drive which is far less likely to fail, and it was onle $18.

For burners I have found that Plextors are worth their price. I use one at work which can burn disks which my Sony has problems with. I have yet to burn a bad disk with the Plextor.