DVD Writers

I am a big fan of NEC/Sony DVD drives as they can easily be made region free. However, while they are good DVD writers for single layer disks, they seems to be a bit of hit and miss when it comes dual layers disks. I have also tried Samsung DVD writers both the desktop and laptop version. Needless to say, they are even worse (okay the models I have anyway). They are slow to read, rubbish at writing. Anyway, at the end, it seems the best writer I have for DVDs (both single and dual layers) is the LG writer I have.

Recently, I have got myself a netbook for its portability, so I am getting a new portable writer to go with it. I was thinking to get a LG writer but the review seems not so good for its reliability (hardware not writing reliability). Hence, I took my chance and ordered an LiteOn writer instead (LiteOn ... it is a mix big on reliability too) as I have already had writers from NEC/Sony, Samsung and LG. LiteOn is the only brand that I haven't own yet. Guess I just need to wait and see ...

Update: With the original firmware came with the drive, it is bad. However, after the drive with the latest firmware from LiteOn, it is okay. I have two brands of DVD+DL. It can burn on some of them okay.

Good to share!

My sister got this cheapy Samsung ML-2010 Laser printer, and it is so simple to set up under the latest version of Linux. You plug the printer in one of the USB port, and you are ready to print. You can't get any simpler than this.

After getting the nice test page printed, I brought up the printer set up tool, and configured the printer to be shared on the network. Both Windows XP and Vista found the printer as they should, however, they required drivers to print. As XP and Vista are two "different" operating systems, I need to download two separate large drivers for two systems (what a pain). Now, there is a problem. The drivers are come as installers, i.e. EXE files. Luckily, if you expand it using 7-zip, you will find these driver EXEs are just fancy archived files. Once you expanded the file, pointed Windows to the right direction, you are ready to print too.

Update Previously, I have problem to print from certain application in Vista. This problem has now solves by using the connection string below instead.

http://<hostname>:631/printers/<printername>