LG GSA5163D 16X EXTERNAL $134.89 AMAZON

[jpuntel]

THis Model is hard to come by in the US. It's a warm deal, now that it's successor is due in Apriil. It beats Sam's Club by $2 and no tax.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B0007VBQ5A/qid=1111691280/sr=1-2/ref=sr_1_2_etk-electronics/104-8520140-6515138?v=glance&s=electronics&n=172282

[TCAS]

THis Model is hard to come by in the US. It's a warm deal, now that it's successor is due in Apriil. It beats Sam's Club by $2 and no tax.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B0007VBQ5A/qid=1111691280/sr=1-2/ref=sr_1_2_etk-electronics/104-8520140-6515138?v=glance&s=electronics&n=172282

You can buy the same drive from Newegg.com for $65.

http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDe ... 049&depa=1

[ClayBuster]

THis Model is hard to come by in the US. It's a warm deal, now that it's successor is due in Apriil. It beats Sam's Club by $2 and no tax.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B0007VBQ5A/qid=1111691280/sr=1-2/ref=sr_1_2_etk-electronics/104-8520140-6515138?v=glance&s=electronics&n=172282

You can buy the same drive from Newegg.com for $65.

http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDe ... 049&depa=1

You must have missed the EXTERNAL part

[TCAS]

I am sorry Claybuster; you are right I didn't count for "External" side of it.

[jpuntel]

From a technical stand point, it is the same drive. The hook is that I've read that there has been alot of problems getting this drive to work in a external case. What I do like about this drive is that it has USB and Firewire connections.

[VEFF]

I think you can save about $40 by buying an external enclosure for $21.99 + shipping and the newegg internal version of the drive for $65 + tax.

The one BIG minus is that people have posted that you might not get full speed from 16X DVD burners when using an external enclosure.

[TCAS]

CD Freaks has performed evaluation on this drive with "Editor Chioce" award being given to it.

[jpuntel]

I been looking at the LG forum, over at CDFreaks, rarely can anyone get more than 20mb transfer rate using USB 2.0, thats around 12X. Firewire seems to fare much better. you have to have USB if you plan on any firmware update, firewire won't do it. As I stated before, nothing but problems trying to use the 4163 as an external. I don't think anyone has made a successful transformation with this combination.

[TCAS]

Jpuntel wrote:

but problems trying to use the 4163 as an external. I don't think anyone has made a successful transformation with this combination.

If you don't want to use this drive as external than you better buy Internal version of it for half this price.

[ETP]

TCAS! Checked the prices at newegg recently on burners. WOW!

[jpuntel]

The price dropped to $128.15, at Amazon.

[jpuntel]

WOW, 5 hours later, it's $141, I should have pulled the trigger last night.