So I want to add a second hard drive to my late 2009 Mac mini. I found OWC has a kit, very cool. So I saw a video about using the optical or super drive I think it is sometimes called outside the machine. That would be very cool as I still make disks of my music. I have no trouble taking it apart as years ago I upgraded the ram to 8g. I found some USB adapter cables that said they work with slim line 7+6 13 pin optical drives as well as hard drives. Some have said they work great and others say the cannot burn a disk or they can play a cd but not a dvd. Anyone try this and do these usb connectors work.
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Using optical drive outside of mini ( first post )
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I have not tried those adapters, but if you are just looking for an external USB optical drive, you could probably find some better ones around the cost of the adapters to use your aging and slower superdrive.
You can buy an external USB DVD/CD drive "for cheap" that will probably work better than your old internal optical drive. May even be less than the cost of an enclosure.
In my experience, CD/DVD drives have a pretty limited life expectancy. They eventually fail to read and/or write. If your 2009 is still working, you are very lucky. I would not invest anything into it. I now consider them somewhat disposable devices. A cheaper drive is probably a wiser investment.
As other said, get external USB burner.
If you rip and burn discs a lot you can also get desktop sized burner and enclosure. It'll be larger than the Mac Mini, but it'll rip and burn much quicker than mobile burners.
If you rip and burn discs a lot you can also get desktop sized burner and enclosure. It'll be larger than the Mac Mini, but it'll rip and burn much quicker than mobile burners.
@Consultant was referring to an external 5.25" desktop ODD in an enclosure, which takes up much more space than the Mac Mini.
Even the smaller 5.25" enclosures, like the OWC Mercury Pro is still larger than a Mac Mini. It is about 66% larger:
OWC Mercury Pro Optical Drive External Enclosure
Makes CD, DVD, and Blu-ray disc burning easy. A fast USB 3.0 interface and an aluminum design provides convenience and flexibility for both Macs and PCs.
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@Consultant was referring to an external 5.25" desktop ODD in an enclosure, which takes up much more space than the Mac Mini.
Even the smaller 5.25" enclosures, like the OWC Mercury Pro is still larger than a Mac Mini. It is about 66% larger:
OWC Mercury Pro Optical Drive External Enclosure
Makes CD, DVD, and Blu-ray disc burning easy. A fast USB 3.0 interface and an aluminum design provides convenience and flexibility for both Macs and PCs.
I have one I purchase in 2012 and it still working on USB3 ports!
Which is why I was pointing out how small my Samsung Drive is...@Consultant was referring to an external 5.25" desktop ODD in an enclosure, which takes up much more space than the Mac Mini.
Even the smaller 5.25" enclosures, like the OWC Mercury Pro is still larger than a Mac Mini. It is about 66% larger:
OWC Mercury Pro Optical Drive External Enclosure
Makes CD, DVD, and Blu-ray disc burning easy. A fast USB 3.0 interface and an aluminum design provides convenience and flexibility for both Macs and PCs.
Oh, I thought you were saying that they were not Mac Mini sized.Which is why I was pointing out how small my Samsung Drive is...
I have two portable sized USB ODDs and one 5.25" ODD, and the 5.25" one is much more faster.
If space wasn't an issue, and it didn't need to be portable, the 5.25" ODD might be a better option for the OP.