ASUS Powerful Blu-ray Drive with 16x Writing Speed and USB 3.0 for Both Mac/PC Optical Drive BW-16D1X-U

I was a little nervous after some of the reviews talking about the button on front and the switch in back. I dont get it, the switch on the back is easy to push on and off and the button on the front works just fine as well. Via Itunes I tested this against an LG BP50NB40 slim. I ripped a rather Large Norah Jones CD (forgot which one it was). The LG took 3 minutes 19 secs. The Asus took 2 minutes 7 seconds. The extra speed is making the cd ripping process much less painful. Could see the extra speed show up when ripping a dvd via MakeMKV as well. I also like that that opening it is electronic. After the CD finishes in Itunes, I just click the eject icon with my mouse, pop in a new CD and hit the front button on the Asus and off it goes. Super happy with the purchase. On a side note, and I will need to see if there is a way around it. I planned on using one with MakeMKV (since you can select which blu ray device to use) to rip my movies for plex, and then at the same time use Itunes and the Asus to rip CDs. Seems Itunes wont recognize the Asus while Make MKV is ripping a movie. Odd.

For my needs this drive has worked perfectly. I bought in 2019 for $100 new. Now in 2025 same drive same specs 4 years of Bidenflation cost $179!!!!!!! My old one is wearing out but paying $179 for at most $120 Blu-ray drive is insane. Time to cut prices 4 years of communism is out the door make Blu-ray drives great again.

A few things you should know: the power button is on the rear and that is annoying. This uses an AC adapter it is not USB powered. The eject button is not well designed but it does work, you have to hit it just right. The blue light on the front is very bright and large. It is the fastest optical drive I have ever used it initializes the disk quickly and the seek time is the fastest I have ever seen. That being said if you need a great optical drive this fits the bill however it could definitely use improved ergonomics, and the giant blue light on the front should be replaced with a small LED.

Used this drive to archive about 10 hours of family home movies (approximately 25.5GB) onto Blu-ray discs for Christmas gifts. The device performed exactly as needed with no issues. Setup was straightforward on Windows - I don't recall needing to download any special software to get it working.The build quality seems solid, and the drive operated quietly without any heating problems during the lengthy burn process. While I can't speak to specific write speeds, the burning process took around 4 hours for my large video project, which seemed reasonable.Any error messages or compatibility issues I encountered were related to my video editing software, not the drive itself. For my needs - creating a permanent archive of precious family memories - this drive did its job perfectly.Note that I only used it with Windows and USB 3.0, so I can't speak to Mac compatibility or USB 2.0 performance. But for anyone looking to archive large amounts of data or video onto Blu-ray, this drive delivers.

As of: 03/2024, the drive is fine. Once in a while it won't read a disc, and once the computer is restarted it'll work. Although that could potentially be the operating system, but on a Mac, that kinda seems unlikely. To update firmware, you need to be on a Windows machine. That's so 2000's. If you're a Mac user, find a friend with a windows computer.The drive door seems to rattle at times making you think it's the drive mechanism, but it's just its thin plastic door. And the gears for the door opening and closing gets a little noisy after about two months. I might try and put electronic grease on it later.For digitizing my DVD/CD library to a NAS... AWESOME! With MakeMKV these two are a awesome combination.The speed is great too. It blows those thin, cheap, push to close three times, drives we are all used to now. This one is a full automated tray (open & close) like they were when CD-rom drives first came out.The power button on the back is terrible; they tried to make it carved and angular like the design of the case, but that makes it hard to grasp and slide it on and off. Also, there's a HUGE blue LED (1.5") on the top that says "Ice On Fire." At night... IN YOUR FACE! They could have saved money by not having all that fancy designing elements. Looks very 80's inspired.All that said, for what I'm putting it through (constant ripping) the drive is worth it. For a once in a while drive... get something cheaper.