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[ Go to January 1997 Table of Contents ]
Plasmon Afterburner CDR4240e Afterburner Propels You to the World of CD- -- by James E. Powell
Novice CD-ROM creators and would-be CD producers have a new creative outlet. The Afterburner CDR4240e is a Plug-and-Play 2X write/4X play CD-Recordable drive with software that lets you make your own CDs. The Afterburner comes in an internal version ($599) or an external ($699) SCSI drive version. Various packaging options include a SCSI card or exclude software. I tested the external SCSI model with the AdvanSys AdvanSCSI PCI ABP930 adapter card. Setup on my AST Pentium 166 system running Windows 95 was a breeze. The Adaptec Easy-CD Pro software properly identified the Afterburner drive and its capabilities. To record a CD, you can write files on the fly or create an image on your hard disk to be copied in its entirety. The Afterburner supports a variety of recording formats, including CD-I , CD-ROM XA and four recording options (track-at-once, packet writing, multisession and disc-at-once, the last being best for audio CDs) To get started, I inserted a fresh CD-R disc in the tray, dragged and dropped files from Windows 95 Explorer into the main Easy-CD Pro screen, and clicked on the Write button. The Easy-CD Pro software allows you a trial run to ensure that you won't hit the buffer underrun (and thus create an unusable disc). Creating a 613MB CD took 35 minutes to test and just under 37 minutes to write. The Afterburner 4240 reports itself as a Type 5 device, so it can work as a "normal" CD-ROM drive. As a 4X drive, its random access time is approximately 230 milliseconds, making it faster than previous models but by no means a speed demon in these days of 8X and 12X drives. The Afterburner's easy setup and use makes it a good choice, especially for the newcomer to recordable CD.
Copyright © 1997 CMP Media Inc.
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