help w. replacing dvd burner

anc001 · 10th October 2011, 5:40 PM

dear wonderful OCAUers, please forgive my hideous noobishness!

It used to be that I would try to upgrade components every little while and keep on top of things, but the last couple of years I've just let my system get older without upgrading anything and unfortunately this makes my life alot harder when something needs to be replaced.

So I currently have this mobo
http://www.asrock.com/mb/overview.as...4coredual-vsta

with 2 SATA hard drives and one PATA (the boot drive).

the DVD drive (LiteOn DH-20A4P08C) has given up on me and I don't have a spare SATA plug to put an upgraded (SATA) one in.
So what are my best options,
1) are there converter cables so I can run a newer DVD drive on this old system?
2) Should I buy a cheap old DVD drive or
3)what about those external USB ones designed for laptops?
4)other options?

thanks for reading, and thanks a million for any advice

death · 10th October 2011, 6:10 PM

a) either a usb drive
b) you can still get pata drives somewhere
c) also you can get a PCI (or PCI-E etc..) sata card that gives you more ports

Option b and c are best
The pata burners are getting expensive though it would be cheaper and better to go with option C

Also consider a bluray burner instead LG can be picked up for about 85

SLATYE · 10th October 2011, 6:18 PM

Computer Alliance have the DVR-118L in stock.

Edit: or you can get an IDE-SATA adaptor here.

Jon187 · 10th October 2011, 6:29 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by SLATYE

Computer Alliance have the DVR-118L in stock.

Edit: or you can get an IDE-SATA adaptor here.

I recommend getting the PATA drive. the adapters can be quite picky on certain chipsets.

JT

anc001 · 10th October 2011, 6:48 PM

great, thanks for that you wonderful OCAUites,
I've ordered a cheap PATA drive.

10th October 2011, 6:10 PM	#2
death Member Join Date: Dec 2002 Location: Melbourne Australia Posts: 1,439	a) either a usb drive b) you can still get pata drives somewhere c) also you can get a PCI (or PCI-E etc..) sata card that gives you more ports Option b and c are best The pata burners are getting expensive though it would be cheaper and better to go with option C Also consider a bluray burner instead LG can be picked up for about 85 __________________ Successful trades (in order of trade): r4z3r, ejukated, po3tik_one, joshconno, Ulan, aTa, ScreaM, smunsa, bajor1, troll, triggerhippie, kdistill, kr0k, Johnny English, antari Last edited by death; 10th October 2011 at 6:16 PM.

10th October 2011, 6:18 PM	#3
SLATYE SLATYE, not SLAYTE Join Date: Nov 2002 Location: Canberra Posts: 25,773	Computer Alliance have the DVR-118L in stock. Edit: or you can get an IDE-SATA adaptor here. __________________ Main system: Phenom II X4 920 \| 8GB (4x 2GB) DDR2-800 \| Gigabyte M57SLI-S4 v2.0 \| Leadtek Geforce 9600GSO 384MB \| Enermax Modu82+ 525W \| 1TB Hitachi HDD \| 3.5" + 5.25" FDD Laptop: Compal EL80 \| C2D T7200 \| 320GB Fujistu HDD \| 2GB DDR2-667 \| GF Go 7600 Last edited by SLATYE; 10th October 2011 at 6:21 PM.