Plextor drives out the CD-RW

Posted on 21 May 2003 at 18:04

Plextor has announced its last CD-burning drives.

Plextor has announced the last of its CD-RW drives and will now concentrate its development efforts on DVD-writers and breaking new markets with its flash memory sticks.

The rear guard of its CD-burners, therefore, will comprise its lowest priced unit to date - a 52/24/52 speed drive with 2Mb buffer for £69 inc VAT, available in June - and premium internal and external drives. These are of the E-IDE and USB 2 variety and offer an 8Mb buffer memory, password-protection for data, and the ability to write up to 1.2Gb a disc.

The drives also have software tools for error-checking and quality assurance as well as support for 99min CDs. The drives are available now for £93 inc VAT for the internal, and £152 inc VAT for the external.

Plextor's sales and marketing manager, Patrick Peeters, told us that although this range would mark the end of CD-RW development, he expects the drives to have a lengthy stay in high street shops of 18 months or so.

Next month will also see the launch of Plextor's external DVD+R/RW drive with USB 2 and FireWire interfaces. It offers 4/2.4/12 speed performance and a 2Mb buffer memory as well as a range of authoring software for £264 inc VAT.

However, Peeters expected DVD writers to become commoditised even more quickly than CD-burners, and said we would see £100 DVD burners within six months to year.

With margins being squeezed on the optical drives, Plextor is now turning its eye to new markets and is launching a PlexFlash USB 2 memory drive in 128Mb, 256Mb and 512Mb capacities for £65, £116 and £222 inc VAT respectively - available now.

Author: Matt Whipp