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Hi,

Although the reviews are good i'm still baffled about what to get. Nothing to do with you guys its just that as technical minded as I am, I still rely on other ppls reviews and experiences in these things to help me decide and like today it doesn't do me favours especialy when I hear/ read contradictory reviews or experiences from others.

Anyway I decided only to go for the most recent reviews on here to help narrow things down and compared it what was available and came up with Sony Sony DRU-830A, Samsung SH-S182D/BEBN and LG GSA-H22N although I was a little keen on the Benq 1655 but I couldn't find one.

In terms of price I'd rather stay around the £20-£25 i.e. the prices for the samsung and LG r ok but I also don't mind stretching the budget a little to accomodate for better spec/features/usability etc (ie if that applies to the sony). I'm mainly looking at an all rounder less hassle drive, although I don't ming tweeking it up with firmwares etc as long as things don't get too time consuming and over tech.

Apart from whats mentioned I am open to any other suggestions.

Sorry for the long post just one more thing- I built My PC in Oct 2005 and its been sitting doing nothing all this time and now I'm kicking myself up the a**e for leaving it but I found out too late that the reason it keeps crashing and displaying Machine_Check_Exception could be because my DVDROM probably isn't compatible with my settings as it is from a system bought in 1998. I came to this conclution as it only happens when I insert a disc. Which is why I'm forcfully upgrading (bearing in mind I have two systems already both with DVD RW drives). What do you guys think, is my thinking correct?

Thnx (and once again sorry for the long post guys)

The Sony DRU-830A and Samsung SH-S182D are essentially the same drive.

You might want to check out the January DVD writer poll to see what other people are liking these days.

http://www.cdrlabs.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=22829

I can't imagine the DVD drive being the root cause of a blue screen of death on insertion-- unless the drive itself was becoming defective. But not due solely to its age. If you don't want to buy a DVD drive, I'd do much more troubleshooting on the software side.

Try turning off autorun, uninstall any burning software you may have (ANYTHING) and re-install one application at a time.

Do you have packet writing software installed? InCD/DirectCD/Drag2Disc/etc? Uninstall that for sure and see what happens.

Try taking one of the functional DVDRW drives from another unit and putting it in the crashing computer to see if they work.

Hi, Thanx guys.

Ian thanx for the link, there seems to be a clear winner there, I made enquireies at my local, a bit expensive but he goes that aparantly ppl buy this drive as you can copy xbox games with it. Good to know but I still have my beloved PS2 as I cant afford to divorce it for a new love at the mo! Eclipse Computers (eclipsecomputers.co.uk) aren't far from me the web has a price of £23 so I'll check out their instore price.

And Justin thanx for your advice. I don't know y I didn't think to swap drives, Normally I do take these kinds of logical steps. Thanx for reminding me. As for the software The only thing I have on it is a fresh install of windows and I havn't used it since, come to think of it I havn't registered it so it probs wont work now until I do so.

An interesting thing I observed was that I had no Issues with using the PC with Linux running from the Disc (not installed-4got what its called again), however i'm limmted with the drive being in use and if I do intall it to the HD I'm not used to it anyway and being a student the apps at Uni on the majority of PCs will not be compatible as they all run on the o so wonderful windows.

So anyway I suppose it cannot really be anything software related unless its an issue with being compatible with XP Home. The only other thing is it could be an issue with the setup but I would say its unlikly.

So thanx guys anyway, Ill give the other drive a go and see where I get and if it works I suppose I shall add a DVR-111 to the setup. (I have thought of just buying a standard DVDROM as replacement but thought it would be better just to fully upgrade the drive for completness).

Any other tips welcome to sort my issue before I go and part with my hard earned £'s which could instead be wasted on cheap beers and nights out!

looks like i'm getting a new opticle drive guys. I put in one of the drives from my other PC and hey presto, my first self built computers works after over a year of it being idle due to me not knowing what the problem was (or still is!). This ones stumped me. I had another suggestion it could be my memory if its a standard one, but I knew it wasn't that I tested it with Mem test cd to check it and it was replaced twice, even though they were in good working order.

So anyway it looks like my standard DVD drive is no use on my self made machine, so it'll go to charity or the bin. Its been a learning experience, I lost a lot due to returning products for exchange/checking, I went a bit crazy with the graphics card on ebay, ended up buying xp home a few months ago which isn't even upgradable to vista and a heavy depreciation on the pc. Lesson learned! will not be doing this again in a hurry, not without proper planning anyway!

Thanx for your help on the drive guys.