Yamaha CRW2100S SCSI CDR-W - Page 7

Conclusion

The Yamaha CRW2100S is a fair choice. It has a competitive price, while it pays you back with it's performance in many cases. Those features are good weapons against the hard competition from most of the other manufacturers, if we exclude Plextor which is clearly the best choice - in case you don't want a SCSI protocol drive. The PX-W1610A however is an ATAPI model, so we cannot make a fair comparison. The lack of 10x RE-writing speed and the non-support of any anti-coaster (BURN-Proof, Justlink) technology is what you will really miss from this drive. As far as it concerns the DAO-RAW feature, it's here, performing pretty well when you demand a backup of your protected cds, but needs some improving (reading LaserLock protected CDs).

So... now we will have to answer: "Should you buy this drive?" or: "Should you go for another one instead?"... The answer comes pretty straightforward: If you want a fast SCSI drive and don't care about 10x RW, nor anti-coaster technology, go for it! On the other hand, if you want the fastest CDRW drive on the market and don't care about the SCSI protocol (but you still want the benefits of BURN-PROOF technology though) you should target for a Plextor as a first choice or a TDK Cyclone as a second one. After that, Sanyo is your next SCSI option if you want to have both (SCSI+BURN-PROOF), but with the price of not-so-fast reading Data/DAE and lack of DAO-RAW support...