Customer Reviews

LaCie 301484U 22X d2 DVDRW DL Lightscribe USB2.0 and FireWire US

5 star:		(26)
4 star:		(9)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(12)

 

 

I purchased the LaCie D2 DVD Firewire Burner with Lightscribe® more than a year ago to use with my Apple iMac. I bought it so I could give my photo customers a custom looking DVD of their paid for images. I only used it a couple of times because the packaged Lightscribe® software didn't always recognize the the burner. I would have to cycle the power many times before it would finally "see" the burner and work. After many months of not using it, I thought by now Lacie would have released a fix for the problem, but they don't even recognize there is a problem. According to the blogs it is a very common problem even with their USB ext HD's. I've tried uninstalling the software, updating the software and reloading it, but nothing. It is a very nice looking, stylish unit, but that does me no good as a paper weight! The few times it worked it worked perfectly. This problem seem to exist between both the Apple and MS platform with either USB or Firewire. I can't recommend this product with a clear conscience to anyone especially when you can't even depend on LaCie for technical assistance.

This is an update to the above posted review: A week after I posted the above review I sent the burner back to LaCie to be repaired it is now working perfectly every time. The folks at LaCie was great. My unit was out of warranty, but they repaired it free of charge and shipped it back to me. The repair did not require any parts just labor. Apparently they had to flash or upgrade the firmware. It now works better than it did when I first purchased it. My Mac "see's" it each and every time I turn it on.

I'm using the LaCie Lightscribe drive on a MacPro under OS 10.5.7 and Toast and it works great: fast audio/data burns and nice labels. The aluminum case is pretty and matches recent Macs well. I originally bought it to use on an old G4 tower and had to go through the process of installing the host driver and labeling program for my new MacPro. Luckily all the needed updates are on the LaCie website. Took me about 10 seconds to google and download them. How easy is that?

The main gotcha is a high high quality label burn takes 20 minutes, so you'll want to save full coverage graphics for special one-off disks. Simple labels like text and line graphics near the center are only a few minutes of write time. You can also get the host driver, a free "Simple Labeler" and prefab labels from HP's Lightscribe site. Hp's Mac support is a little weak and so LaCie's label app really picks up the slack. If you're a Windows user, get your drivers and label apps at HP as they're more Windows centric than LaCie.

Incidentally, this drive is compatible with built-in Apple burning.

No one had reviewed this, so I was questioning buying it or not. I'm glad I did! It works great with iDVD. My macbook didn't come with a super drive so I'm satisfied with this lacie drive.

I purchased this external burner to replace the burned out internal dvd superdrive on my iMac, running Snow Leopard. The price was right, the setup was a breeze, and it performs beautifully and seamlessly with all of my Mac applications including iTunes, iMovie, iDVD, and more. All I did was plug it in, connect it via firewire and it was instantly recognized. No setup necessary at all!

The drive itself rips discs into iTunes blazing fast, and it burns DVD's much faster than the internal drive in the iMac. The unit also runs very quietly and remains totally cool to the touch even when burning DVD's. And, best of all, it has a Firewire passthrough so you can use it as part of a chain of Firewire peripherals. I have it last in line after an external hard drive and it works beautifully. The only real negative I can come up with is that it is a little bit large, but what it lacks in portability it sure makes up for in durability. With it's handsome metal casing to match the iMac, it feels like its built like a tank and performs amazingly well too.

I cannot speak as to the "LightScribe" technology as I have not used it, nor do I plan to. Though it does sound a bit frustrating by other users accounts, I find that particular method of labeling discs rather unnecessary as it really limits your choice of blank media. Don't buy this items for the LightScribe feature, buy it for everything else! Instantly compatible with every program on my iMac.

Quite simply, if you're in need of an external DVD Drive for your Mac, I couldn't recommend this product more highly. You unpack it, plug it in, connect it, and it's good to go. Excellent price too!

I bought this drive a little less than a year ago because my iMac SuperDrive was having problems with burning most types of Double-Layer media, and Apple was playing stupid, pretending they had never heard of such a problem before with any SuperDrives.

I use this drive every day, and it works very well, with the following exceptions:

The LaCie D2 22x DVD Burner drive with Firewire burns many types of media relatively well compared to the SuperDrive. The lightscribe works well too, although installing the software was A NIGHTMARE!!! First of all, you have to go to La Cie's website to get the latest versions of 3 different software installers you have to install SEPARATELY to get the Lightscribe software to recognize the drive properly (and not as a 'Generic' device). If you don't install them in the right order, it won't recognize the drive properly. That being said, now that I finally have it working properly, LaCie's Lightscribe software for Mac is FABULOUS. MUCH better than Nero's crappy Lightscribe software. In fact, truth be told, it will still burn disks acceptably in 'Generic' mode when it isn't recognizing the drive properly, but it is annoying to have that happen.

HERE'S A VALUABLE TIP... Want darker lightscribe burns? Burn the same image TWICE or even THREE TIMES! It will burn the pixels in exactly the same place every time on the disk, so each successive burn just makes it darker. Of course that will take a while... About 20 minutes per burn!

Now onto the BIG PROBLEM I am having with this drive. The disks that you burn on this drive will work great when you also play them back on this drive. HOWEVER, depending on the type of media you use, and the burn speed, it is hit or miss whether they will work on other drives!!! In particular, the SuperDrives in 3 different Macs I have tried it on WON'T read Double-Layer disks that were burned on the LaCie! I tried many types of media, including Verbatim*, Maxell, Phillips, and TDK. Also, in my own home, movie disks burned by this LaCie drive play fine on my Sony PS3, but NOT on my Sony Blu-ray player, or my Toshiba DVD Player. I recently sent out a whole bunch of Wedding DVD's that I had made in iDVD and burned on Double Layer Verbatim Lightscribe disks ($3 a disk). I have been getting NUMEROUS phone calls that these disks WILL NOT play in the homes of the people I sent them to!!! What a waste of time, money and effort!

This drive loses a star for the Lightscribe software being so hard to install, and it loses a star for the disks not working on other players! Otherwise, it is a good drive.

*UPDATE: I have FINALLY discovered ONE SPECIFIC media type that will allow me to burn disks that work in most other drives/DVD Players:

Verbatim 96577 8.5 GB 2.4x-6x Double Layer Recordable Disc DVD+R DL, 50-Disc Spindle

You MUST buy the 2.4X-6X version of these disks, NOT the 8X-10X version. ADDITIONALLY, you must use the SLOWEST burn setting, 2.4X. When burned on the LaCie at 2.4X, these Verbatim disks work successfully in all drives I have tried them with so far, INCLUDING the Mac Superdrive!

It mostly defeats the purpose of having a 22X drive that can only be used successfully at the slowest speed, but at least I finally found a way to make successful burns on this drive that also work on the widest variety of other manufacturer's devices.

Just picked up this CD/DVD burner as a replacement for a longtime faithful Iomega SuperDVD drive and love it! It was super-easy to set up right out of the box and burns discs at record speed. Nicely-constructed unit with great features -- highly recommended, especially for Max OSX users!

I bought this drive because I have a Mac. This is the only optical drive Apple sells beside the one they sell for their MacBook Air. Just like a Mac, it just works!!

First of all, I've seen a number of these, and they all seem to work as advertised - in general. Hooked mine up and it immediately worked with iDVD, DVD player, etc. without even installing the custom LaCie driver package. Burned DVD's to various flavors of -R., +RW, etc. just fine that played back on several computers and a standalone DVD player.

My biggest complaint is the software. I'd seen a number of these come with, forex, toast 7, and work - up to and including copying DVD's and making them from scratch. The documentation and flier on Lacie's website claims that you can "Record professional-quality, personalized DVD's with the included authoring software for Windows or Mac. " as well as "Full burning solution for Mac or PC"

So why, oh why, does the version of Toast 9 that came with my burner, NOT burn any DVD format at all without being upgraded? Not even data disks!

Roxio is up to version 10 fer chrissake! I can deal with not getting the full version of Toast Titanium 10, but they're only including version 9, and why bother including the bloody software at all if it doesn't even get me the functionality of the basic operating system? And could you at least make sure that the software fulfills the capabilities claimed in the manual?

If you want a drive that will use a wide variety of media, then get this drive. I can use the amazonbasics dvd dl disks in this drive, while they fail to burn in every other drive that I have tried. It will also burn the amazonbasics dvd r disks at 16x, whereas my mac superdrive will only burn them at 8x. This is nice for me because the amazonbasics disks are the cheapest disks I can find. The reason I bought this drive, however, was because of the lightscribe. I like lightscribe because I can be creative with what I print on the disks, and I don't have to worry about buying ink. Printing labels with lightscribe can take over 15 minutes if the label is big, but I still prefer it to any other method of labeling because you can get as creative as you want and not worry about the cost. This drive also comes with software that is easy to use and will allow you to print multiple disks at the same time if you ever decide to get another lightscribe drive. I like this part of the software, because even if I decide to buy a cheaper drive, I can still use it with the software that I got with this lightscribe drive.

This is my 2nd LaCie DVD drive and it's working out great. I'm using an old 700MHz eMac with 10.4.11 through Firewire and things couldn't be better. I can burn a full video DVD in about 12 minutes and it's whisper quiet. I haven't had the opportunity to try the LightScribe feature yet, but plan on getting a small package for experimentation purposes. Previous aluminum cases had a ridge along the side that allowed for rack mounting (desk or cabinet) but this one is smooth with no lip to fasten a bracket too. Not a big deal for me, but if someone was stacking several on their desk, the lack of mounting ability on this case could be problematic. I love how the LaCie drives aren't picky about what brand media it uses. I recall the Pioneer drive I installed in my Mac completely choking on Memorex media. I've used TDK, Memorex, Verbatim and others in both of my LaCie drives with no issues. I look forward to many years of use.