Optical drives are still practical for many users, whether to play old CDs and DVDs, install software, or create backups—especially with modern laptops, which are usually supplied without a drive.

Physical media is old school, but there are times where it may make sense for some PC owners. Let's take a look at compact discs (CDs), digital versatile discs (DVDs), and Blu-rays to see which option ...

Do combo movie-watching and music-recording drives have the write stuff? Apparently PC manufacturers think so. After a slow start, combination CD-rewritable and DVD drives are showing up in computers ...

Does your laptop even have a DVD drive anymore? Mine sure doesn’t. Neither did the one I owned before. So, what can you do when you actually have to use a DVD or CD? Well, you can grab an Amicool ...

Most modern laptops lack an optical drive, yet CDs and DVDs are still used in many households, whether for playing old movies, installing older software, or even for making physical backups. An ...

Physical media, including vinyls, cassettes, and CDs are all the rage right now. If you're looking to dust off your collection of DVDs and put them to use in your Windows PC, getting them playing is ...

We independently review everything we recommend. We may make money from the links on our site. Learn more› By Arthur Gies Arthur Gies is an editor for Wirecutter's tech coverage. He's written about ...

Most optical drives today are combo CD/DVD drives that support all the DVD and CD formats. The speeds of the drives are rated by their DVD-ROM and CD-ROM transfer rates. The original DVD drive (1x) ...

Apple's DVD Player will only work with internal DVD drives and will give an error -70012 if you open it with only an external DVD drive attached. Topher Kessler ...