On Sat, Apr 26, 2014 at 07:52:12PM +1000, Erik Christiansen wrote:
Replacing my venerable CD-ROM with a DVD drive has moved onto the to-do list. A quick bit of googling suggests that linux compatibility isn't an issue, and they'll mostly be SATA. Internal drives seem less advertised, but not excessively scarce.
region free firmware is the main stumbling block for me. I lived overseas for quite a while, so I need to play region 1 as well as region 4 discs. some uk discs too.
Is it the case that some makes (e.g. LG) read scratched discs better than others (e.g. ASUS)? The 3:1 price difference between HP and ASUS doesn't surprise much, since that's usually the cost of the name plate.
I hear it's pretty random... my 2c is that an ancient sony dvd-rom and newish matshita dvd-rw behave about the same on my scratched discs. however a stand-alone panasonic dvd player (not attached to a computer) reads them much better. <<hmmm - optimistically pulls apart dvd player and unfortunately sees nothing looking like sata - although I did find pads for serial and usb>> cheers, robin