RSS Feeds
Hardware
Philips/Lite-On Blu-ray Drive to Ship for a Dirt-Cheap $186
Posted by Charlie White at 6:10 AM on November 17, 2007
If you want to just play back Blu-ray discs on your PC, this Lite-On branded BD-ROM drive from Philips will do the trick at 4x for $186. Let's get this straight: You can't burn Blu-ray discs with this drive. However, for playback, you'd better have enough hardware oomph to handle all that data flowing through your video system. To be first marketed in Taiwan at the end of this month, these cheap players are expected to be launched later in the rest of the world. If all you want to do is play back Blu-ray movies on your computer, there's no use paying the $300-$500 for a burner. This might come in handy for an occasional flick at the desk, or Blu-ray playback in a PC-equipped home theater. [DigiTimes]
Comments (AU Comments · US Comments)
There are currently no AU comments for this post.
polyprog
Posted 3:14 PM 16/11/07
YAY for $186 blue balloon popping laser
polyprog
ImTheKing
Posted 3:01 PM 16/11/07
@Charlie White - I would think this would work well on a MacPro system. What are you thoughts on that? Think its powerful enough?
ImTheKing
St3v3
Posted 2:35 PM 16/11/07
I think I'll wait until the Blu-ray burners come down to $200.00 in the next 6 to 12 months.
St3v3
liquidsoapdispenser
Posted 4:31 PM 16/11/07
I wonder if the new Mac Pros supposedly being announced next week will have Blu-ray burners?
liquidsoapdispenser
ekornblum
Posted 4:23 PM 16/11/07
ummm, perfect for library/archive type situations. You have one machine with a drive that can burn, and then lots of clients that just need drives to read and/or unarchive the data off the discs.
ekornblum
frigg
Posted 3:40 PM 16/11/07
what a tease. Who would put a BD drive into a computer you can't actually burn to. Actually, this thing will burn... it will burn customers who think they can back up data to it!
frigg
ekornblum
Posted 5:40 PM 16/11/07
No Mac software yet for playing blu-ray or hd-dvd video discs, but you can write/read as data discs to back up all your, uhhh, spreadsheets. yeah. definitely spreadsheets.
ekornblum
itchytooth
Posted 5:08 PM 16/11/07
@ImTheKing: and @liquidsoapdispenser: I didn't think there was even Mac software that would read Blu-ray or HD-DVD yet. Did I miss something?
itchytooth
nate011
Posted 4:44 PM 16/11/07
I think LG's drive is a better deal. Its been out for quite some time now.
[www.newegg.com]
It plays Blu-ray and HD-DVD and it is a Dual-Layer DVD Burner.
$299
nate011
CyRu5
Posted 7:09 PM 16/11/07
another reason the mac sucks for media use
CyRu5
daftrok
Posted 7:56 PM 16/11/07
Or just make one for $1000+ less
daftrok
daftrok
Posted 7:48 PM 16/11/07
If the Mac Pro's maintain their same price and feature a Blu ray burning drive along with 16x superdrive for the same $2499 price point, then it will be the ideal workstation to buy.
daftrok
ThriftyTechie
Posted 10:04 PM 16/11/07
Who needs a blu-ray player for their computer?
Who needs a blu-ray burner for their computer?
ThriftyTechie
diabolusunknown
Posted 11:07 PM 16/11/07
@ThriftyTechie:
1. To build yourself an all-in-one media center PC with the capability of playing blu-ray movies (and HD if you get the LG dual-drive, which is a better deal), record TV, store numerous movies, play music, and on and on. TBH, alot cheaper than getting two separate players that can output 1080P (so no low end HD-DVD players, basically).
2. To burn the things from one.
diabolusunknown
Galley
Posted 12:49 PM 17/11/07
@ThriftyTechie:
Many computers have 1080p displays.
Galley
ThriftyTechie
Posted 7:28 PM 22/11/07
Again, I just don't see it.
If you want to play Blu-ray on your TV, just buy a blu-ray player.
And again, why have a blu-ray burner? If it was inexpensive, then sure. But there are so many cheaper and more convenient and cheaper ways to archive/store/transfer data that the blu-ray burner just seems to be the answer to a question that no one is asking.
ThriftyTechie