LaCie d2 External Blu-ray burner (2X BD-R/E)
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CNET editors' review
CNET editors' rating
Reviewed by:
Ryan Belonga
Reviewed: 7/24/07
Editorial policies
Read CNET editors' review
The good:
Supports all optical media types except HD DVD; works with PC and Mac; can burn 8cm or 12cm discs.
The bad:
Very expensive; stingy phone support.
The bottom line:
The LaCie d2 Blu-ray burner offers good performance speeds, but it's still prohibitively expensive. Home users should wait for Blu-ray burners to drop in price and improve in performance.
Specs:
CD / DVD type:
BD-RE;
CD / DVD read speed:
32x (CD) / 8x (DVD) / 2x (BD);
CD / DVD write speed:
24x (CD) / 8x (DVD±R) / 4x (DVD±R DL) / 2x (BD-R) / 2x (BD-R DL)
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Price range:
$649.99
CD / DVD type:
BD-RE
CD / DVD read speed:
32x (CD) / 8x (DVD) / 2x (BD)
CD / DVD write speed:
24x (CD) / 8x (DVD±R) / 4x (DVD±R DL) / 2x (BD-R) / 2x (BD-R DL)
CD / DVD rewrite speed:
16x (CD) / 6x (DVD-RW) / 8x (DVD+RW) / 2x (BD-RE) / 2x (BD-RE DL)
CNET editors' review
Reviewed by:
Ryan Belonga
Edited by:
Felisa Yang
Reviewed on 7/24/07
The LaCie d2 External Blu-ray drive is a decent though expensive burner. It supports all optical media formats except HD DVD. The LaCie d2's performance beats that of Sony's newest internal offering, the
BWU-100A, though at just under $1,000, the LaCie is about $300 more expensive than the BWU-100A. Unless you're a video professional who absolutely requires HD burning capability, our advice is to wait until prices drop by several hundred dollars and write speeds go up.
| Drive type |
External Blu-ray multidrive |
| Supported media |
BD-ROM; BR-RE (25GB and 50GB); BD-R (25GB and 50GB); DVD-ROM; DVD-Video; DV+/-R DL; DVD+/-R; DVD+/-RW; CD-R; CD-RW; CD-DA; CD-ROM; Video CD, Photo CD, CD Text, CD Extra |
| Maximum write speeds |
2X BD-R; 2X BD-RE; 4X DVD+/-R DL; 8X DVD+/-R; 8X DVD+RW; 6X DVD-RW; 32X CD-R; 24X CD-RW |
| Buffer memory |
8MB |
| Dimensions (WDH) |
5.75x7.48x1.63 inches |
| Notable design features |
None |
| Interface |
1x USB 2.0 port; 2x FireWire 400 ports (6-pin IEEE 1394a) |
| Supported operating systems |
Windows XP SP2 or Mac OS 10.3.9 or higher |
| System requirements |
Windows: Pentium 4 Dual Core 3GHZ processor or higher; Mac: PowerPC G4 or Mac Intel processor or higher; minimum 512MB RAM |
| HD video playback |
Nvidia 7600GT, ATI X1600 series GPU with latest driver; minimum 1,280x1,024 monitor resolution. Playing protected BD movies in HD through a digital DVI or HDMI interface requires an HDCP GPU and HDCP-ready display |
| Software included |
Total media Extreme (Windows); Toast 7.1.1 Titanium |
| Any additional features |
Supports 8cm or 12cm discs |
| Service and support |
One-year warranty; toll-based phone support available weekdays from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. PT; LaCie's Web site includes FAQs, document downloads, and e-mail support. |
In our CNET Labs' tests, the LaCie d2 Blu-ray drive performed on a par with other Blu-ray drives we've tested. Technically speaking, though, the d2 had the edge based on its higher bandwidth connection. For our tests, we used the FireWire 400 port. Ripping an 8.47GB commercial DVD movie took 23 minutes and 12 seconds. Burning that image to a DVD+R DL took 20 minutes and 50 seconds. A 4.48GB mixed data file took 10 minutes and 23 seconds to burn to DVD. It took the drive 4 minutes and 13 seconds to rip a 746MB commercial CD. Burning the CD image to a CD-R took 4 minutes and 37 seconds. When it came to HD content, the LaCie d2 essentially matched the Sony BWU-100A internal drive, though the d2 won by a very slight margin. Burning a BD-R with 23GB of mixed data files took 1 hour, 39 minutes, and 46 seconds, where the BWU-100A took 1 hour, 40 minutes, and 11 seconds. Ripping that same file took the LaCie drive 4 hours, 56 minutes, and 5 seconds; the BWU-100A took 5 hours, 2 minutes, and 22 seconds.
