Samsung SM348 48X/24X/16X CDRW-DVD Review

Optical drives are an old technology, but still constitute one of the pillars of ever computer system. A combo drive as the industry terms them, are a combination of a CD-R/RW burner with a DVD-ROM. The Samsung SM348 is a combo drive which boasts the following read and burn speeds for the four essential optical media platforms.

• CD Read Speed: 48X
• CD-R Write Speed: 48X
• CD-RW Rewrite Speed: 24X
• DVD Read Speed: 16X

The 24X CD-RW rewrite speed threw us for a bit of a loop because we were unable to find any CD-RW recordable media rated above the current "high-speed" of 10X to test with in our area. A quick check online shows us that the top speeds for CD-RW media (in Canada at least) looks like this; Maxell (10x), Memorex (10X), TDK (10X), Yamaha (10X), etc. Without an easily accessible supply of CDRW media rated near, or at 24X, this aspect of the Samsung SM-348 isn't really being used - yet. As you'll see, this also puts a bit of a dampener on our CDRW rewrite tests as the results are capped off at 10X.

In any event, the remaining aspects of the SM-348 are nice; the drive is quite in operation, the geared tray mechanism is smooth and nearly silent, and any burner with DVD capabilities built right in for a little over $100USD is a winner in my book.

Samsung SM-348 CDRW-DVD
	Ships with the following: User's Guide Easy CD Creator Standard Software Audio jumper cable (4-pin connector) Philips mounting screws 40-pin IDE CABLE Manufacturer: www.samsung.ca

Samsung ship the SM-348 with Power DVD and Easyt CD Creator in addition to all the cables and screws you're likely to get in a retail package. I personally prefer Nero Burning ROM, but Easy CD works just as well. The drive supports what Samsung term SuperLink which is Buffer Underrun Protection of the same order as BurnProof, or any of the other technologies that prevent coasters from being created due to a bad burn. The drive features 8MB of onboard buffer memory and can be mounted in both vertical or horizontal positions.

The tray accepts full-size 120mm diameter CD's and smaller half-size 80mm diameter CD's. The front bezel follows along with previous Samsung drives - setting itself apart with a rounded tray cover. Button and controls on the front of the SW240 include an eject button, small indicator LED, headphone jack and volume wheel. Round back we find all the usuall connectors, so there is no point in mentioning them here. Now, let's take this drive for a test and see what kind of performance we can expect to see...