Sony Optiarc Europe announced today that it will begin shipping its new 24x DVD writer, the AD-7240S, in March of this year. While there aren't a lot of details yet, Optiarc has stated that the Serial ATA equipped AD-7240S will be capable of 24x DVD±R, 12x DVD±R DL and 12x DVD-RAM writing speeds. The drive will also support Optiarc's Auto Strategy and Adaptive Self Tuning technologies which optimize writing quality and performance by compensating for disc and drive variations.

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While Optiarc America has not made any official announcements regarding the AD-7240S, sources at the company indicated that the drive will be hitting the North American market about the same time as Europe.