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Looking for burner with tray that clears the door

W

wuster

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Mar 23, 2008
6
0
Hey folks,

When I got my Mac Pro I immediately connected a Sony burner I already owned into the 2nd optical drive bay, removed the plastic front face piece of the tray as mentioned in previous threads, only to find out that the tray still clips the drive door so it gets stuck. (argh!! If only Apple gave a few additional millimeters!)

This is a case where that extra few millimeters in tray position meant the drive was physically incompatible with the Mac Pro. Before I go shopping for a new drive, I'd like to find out if you guys have recommended brand/models that you KNOW fits into your Mac Pros (because you installed it and it works, duh). :)

I tried "eyeballing" tray height in online pictures, but they all look about the same. And you never know until you take off the front face...

Thanks all!
 
I just installed a Samsung SH-S203N in my Mac Pro a couple of week ago and it works beautifully. It is an SATA drive though so it took a bit of work to actually install (mostly routing a cable down to the board) and it doesn't work in Windows (yet) because I haven't enabled AHCI.
 
Guiyon said:
I just installed a Samsung SH-S203N in my Mac Pro a couple of week ago and it works beautifully. It is an SATA drive though so it took a bit of work to actually install (mostly routing a cable down to the board) and it doesn't work in Windows (yet) because I haven't enabled AHCI.
Click to expand...

I am looking to upgrade my DVD drives to SATA ones also, what is this AHCI mentioned here and how does one enable it under Windows?
 
yomibro said:
I am looking to upgrade my DVD drives to SATA ones also, what is this AHCI mentioned here and how does one enable it under Windows?
Click to expand...

To be honest, it requires quite a few hacks and is thus a pain. I think it's much easier to just load up one PATA and one SATA burner. You get the extra bandwidth to use both opticals at the same time as well as windows compatibility (for the PATA burner) with no headaches.
 
Did you remove the front plate off the tray? I know Pioneers come with a clip-on face plate on the front of the tray that will interfere with the doors on the MP's. To remove this plate just twist it out towards you on the bottom to release the tangs and then lift it straight up. Hope this helps.
 
I would agree with izibo here; it requires a lot of hacks and just isn't worth the trouble for most people. Unless you are really comfortable working with GRUB's internals I wouldn't advise it. My primary reasons are that I can (hacking for the sake of hacking is always the best reason :) ) and I am planning on ripping out the PATA drive eventually.

To get back on topic, I would suggest checking out XLR8YourMac's Drive compatibility database; there are tons of reports from various drives there and issues like your tend to get reported on fairly well.
 
My MP came with 1 Pioneer DVR-112D. I was able to pick up a second one on a search through Pricewatch for under $40 shipped. After taking off the front bezel it worked fine. The best thing is both of these drives seem to burn DL dvd's and not be picky about it. My old MP with a Pioneer DVR-111D would only burn at the advertised speed if I used Verbatim brand disks. I had a whole bunch of off-brand blank DL dvd's laying around from various trials on the old drive and as soon as I tried them in the new 112's they all worked as well as the Verbatim's which is good b/c Verbatims are among the priciest DL disks out there.
 
Try this LG Drive. It looks like it has a pretty standard front bezel. It's actually a combo Blu Ray & HD-DVD reader (and DVD-burner).

You could try an external 5.25" CD/DVD enclosure and pair it with the eSATA extender, if you'd like.

Also, if you're just going to be watching BR movies, I just saved myself the headache and bought a Panasonic Blu Ray player console and connected it directly to my monitor. Couldn't be happier.
 
I actually had to file off about 1/4 inch of surplus material from the underside of the drive tray on my rip-lock-less dvdcombo I added.

Wasn't to hard if you take your time :)
 
Tallest Skil said:
My GGW-H20L is SATA, as well. Will I need to do this for Windows, and how do I go about doing it?
Click to expand...

The LG Drives fit. I just installed the same drive. It's a bit of a pain, need to use the two free sata ports on the motherboard behind the front fan assembly.

Hope you have small hands...
 
bigbird said:
Did you remove the front plate off the tray? I know Pioneers come with a clip-on face plate on the front of the tray that will interfere with the doors on the MP's. To remove this plate just twist it out towards you on the bottom to release the tangs and then lift it straight up. Hope this helps.
Click to expand...


just did it, thanx so much :D
Had been only using my second(faster) drive for emergencies LOL
 
nemloc said:
stupid question: what's the benefit of a SATA optical drive over a PATA one?
Click to expand...

For optical drives?

zero...smaller cables, I guess, but in the mac pro, it doesn't really turn out to be a benefit because the optical drive bays are configured for PATA.

If you have a PC with a SATA-only power supply, and SATA-only motherboard, then every drive has the same access to bandwidth, which optical drives are nowhere near close to saturating, so it isn't a big deal right now. There aren't any motherboards with no PATA connectors just yet, but there will be soon now that the final PATA hold-out (optical drives) is moving over to SATA.

The same thing is true of power supply manufacturers...pretty soon PATA will disappear...by this time next year, new motherboards will not even have PATA hardware if you did want use PATA for some reason...

I say it's about time...stupid ribbon cables really ugly up the inside of a case!
 
benpatient said:
For optical drives?

zero...smaller cables, I guess, but in the mac pro, it doesn't really turn out to be a benefit because the optical drive bays are configured for PATA.

If you have a PC with a SATA-only power supply, and SATA-only motherboard, then every drive has the same access to bandwidth, which optical drives are nowhere near close to saturating, so it isn't a big deal right now. There aren't any motherboards with no PATA connectors just yet, but there will be soon now that the final PATA hold-out (optical drives) is moving over to SATA.

The same thing is true of power supply manufacturers...pretty soon PATA will disappear...by this time next year, new motherboards will not even have PATA hardware if you did want use PATA for some reason...

I say it's about time...stupid ribbon cables really ugly up the inside of a case!
Click to expand...

I don't know if you've ever actually tried burning two discs at the same time when they are on the same PATA channel on a Mac. It slows to an absolute crawl.

Now, that I have one PATA and one SATA optical drive, I can burn two discs at full speed.
 
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