Positive:

• Supports BD-R/RE read and write at 2x
• Supports DVD±R DL writing at 4x
• Supports DVD-RAM read and write at 5x
• Supports DVD±R/CD-R/RW writing at 8x/24x/16x
• Reads DVD±R/RW/±R DL/CD-R/CD-ROM at 8x/8x/8x/32x/32x
• Virtually silent operation
• Very good retail package
• Blue operation LED
• 2 year Fast Warranty Service (in EU, Norway and Switzerland: Collect & Return)
• RoHS Compliant

Negative:

• Does not support Mt. Rainier
• Read CD-RW/DA only at max 24x
• No Bitsetting support for DVD+R/RW/+R DL media

Conclusion:

  Let us summarize the most important positive and negative points below:

The main positive points: Belonging to the first generation of Blu-ray writers, the device seems to operate very good on most supported media types.

As the drive is RoHS (Restriction of Hazardous Substances Directive) Compliant, means it should be “Lead-, Mercury- and Cadmium-free” and an environment friendly product.

Last but by no means least. The 2 year collect and return warranty (within the EU) is one of the best ones around.

The main negative points: As the Plextor PX-B900A lacks the bitsetting support (BookType DVD-ROM) on DVD+R, DVD+RW and DVD+R DL media, this could lead to playback problems with some DVD Standalone devices. So any future firmware updates allowing bitsetting support are most welcome.

To sum it all up, this is what we would say: "The Plextor PX-B900A is overall a very good CD/DVD/Blu-ray drive".

By using our price grabber feature cdfreaks.pricegrabber we found the drive listed at 868 USD and at geizhals the drive is listed at 734 EUR (November 2006).

You may discuss/comment this article below or in this forum thread.

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Introduction