Home > Consumer Reviews > Yamaha CRW-F1ZUX 44x24x44 External USB 2.0 CD-RW Drive

Seems unfair to offer a review of a USB 2.0 peripheral based on the lack of a USB 2.0 port on the computer with which it is used. Any USB 2.0 peripheral is easily accommodated on most non-USB 2.0-ported computers with the purchase of an accessory (and easily-installed) USB 2.0 PCI card at about forty or fifty bucks to provide the purported 40 times faster USB 2.0 advantage over USB 1.1 (the reason for choosing USB 2.0 in the first place).
I've used NERO for about six months with no problems; it's a well-designed piece of burn software with good support. My use makes no complaint with its dedication to a single CD-RW/CPU combination. For those with multiple hookups the NERO stand-alone (undedicated) program is available via 'net and local retailers.

I choose the yamaha crw-f1zux (crw-f1) for multiple reasons. One was to back up critical files on my server. And, many professional reviewers touted the software package as a major buying point. However, now I find that the packaged software will not work with my system software and I will have to find another way to accomplish this. This was a major dissapointment with my purchase. I am running windows 2000 server on my personal webserver.

The InCD software, which is part of Nero, was supposed to make CD-RW's essentially act like "floppy drives." The box says, "simply drag and drop." This piece of software quite simply is junk. It crashed my machine over and over. The Nero website has a few sparse system level fixes for this - none worked (if you don't know a lot about system software, you'd never even be able to try most of their fixes. The average user would be miffed). What's worse, Nero never responed to any of the questions I sent them. So in sum this piece of software, which was a selling point of drive for me, was garbage, so strike it off the list .

So lets look at the yamaha box. It says you'll get Dantz Retrospect Express to back up your compter. The box says its "top rated full-version software" which implies that the software can be used to backup any computer. I think a rational person would believe that the packaged software would work on windows based systems - being a "full version" and advertised for "windows 2000." One of the main reasons I bought this cd burner was to back up critical files on my webserver. However, the software would not run with the code supplied. I called Dantz and they told me that I would have to pay 299.00 to use their software on my machine. That's not what the box said; the box lists no exclusions for my system software. This isn't a matter of me "not doing my homework" either. The packaging is misleading. I shouldn't have to go to Dantz Retrospect and Yamaha website to ensure that their advertising is correct and dissect all the possible versions of the software to see if it will match my operating system. If it doesn't work on certain systems, it should not be advertised like it is on the box. It said "windows 2000." Both companies have a responsiblity to see that their product adverstising is not misleading and suggestive. Regardless, Yamaha and Dantz shouldn't leave the customer out in the cold. Now, I have a drive that I intended to use to regularly, easily, and transparently back up critical files and it won't (yes you can use the nero software to copy files in a data fashion, but that's not a backup scheme, it's a workaround.)

So in sum, the CRW-F1 drive/software package didn't live up to my expectations of it. I know that sometimes when you buy a piece of hardware the software inside is a crapshoot. But I'm sorry, if Yamaha is going to claim their hardware/software package is going to deliver certain things, it should. The software included with a the drive is not freeware; I am paying for it when I buy the whole package. And, i expect to have access to it and for it to work.

I should note that I have no problems with the drive for copying cd's. Read other peoples review for that.

Reading the comments from others here is rather funny. First of all, don't buy any external CDRW drive if you don't have at least either a USB 2.0 or Firewire port. Trying to use any external CD burner with a USB 1.1 port is like taking a Formula 1 race car and drive it in traffic hour. That car is not going anywhere even if it can physically reach speeds of 200+ mph.

The USB 1.1 port is simply too slow to be useful (max supported burning through USB 1.1 is only 4X). You are buying a 44X CD burner so you need to have the fastest possible port to support that speed.

This Yahama model happens to be the one for USB 2.0. On any PC desktop computer, you can simply purchase a PCI USB 2.0 adapter card for about [$$] now. It installs easily into an empty PCI card slot in your computer (most computers have available empty PCI slots).

Once you have the proper port to support the "rocket" Yamaha burner, you are ready for some serious burning.

Here's what I find very cool about this burner:

1. It is external and comes with a nice silver aluminum case. Other external burners I've come across usually have a cheap plastic cover. The aluminum case looks sturdy and is a nice piece of hardware that you'd be proud to show off.

2. It has a USB 2.0 port. USB 2.0 is the fastest common external port available right now (even faster than Firewire 1.0, although I hear that Firewire 2.0 is coming out). It is only because of the USB 2.0 port that this drive can support burn speeds of up to 44X.

3. It is VERY quiet. Unlike some cheaper CD burners, this external drive is amazingly quiet. I cannot hear much of anything coming out of this drive during burning sessions.

4. The DiscT@2 feature is the coolest thing I've ever seen. Granted, it really only works with CDRs that have a bluish or green tint on the bottom, it is still way cool in my opinion. DiscT@2 allows you to put any text or images onto the DATA side of the CD. The DiscT@2 technology works by writing on the remaining empty portion of a CD. That means that if you fill up the full capacity of the CD with data, you will not have any room to use with the DiscT@2 feature. For example, if you use a 700MB CDR and you burn 550MB of data onto it, then you would only have a round band about 1/3 inch around the outer edge of the CD to use with DiscT@2. I myself don't like to burn any CD that is not at full capacity (I'm frugal so I like to use up all the space on the CD). However, there are many times when I end up burning a CD at less than full capacity because there is not enough data to fill up the CD. I can now use the DiscT@2 feature to make an imprint of whatever I want onto the remaining empty portion of those CDs.

And for those "coasters" that I had before, I can now reuse the empty spaces on them to create artworks. I tested the DiscT@2 feature on a blank CDR by burning 2 pictures of my son onto the data surface. The DiscT@2 took about 12 minutes to complete the entire CD (there was no data on the CD since it is blank). The pictures came out looking kind of like holographic images, viewable from many angles but still not as clear as if I had printed out the pictures on paper, of course. I find that darker images show up much better so I used Paint Shop Pro to darken my images. Just think of the endless possibilities that are available with this feature. You could, for example, burn a music CD for your loved one and include a special message around the edges of the CD, all without any extra printer or labeling equipment. Best of all, there are NO ink cartridges to buy ever because the Yamaha uses its precise internal lasers to burn the text and images onto the data side of the CD. Experiment with your creative side to see what this can do. Artwork on CD for free is always cool in my book.

5. Support on this drive is great. I was able to go onto the Yamaha website and quickly downloaded the latest firmware upgrade for this drive. The drive is recognized automatically by Windows XP Pro and does not need any separate driver.

Overall, I am very satisified with this external Yamaha CRW-F1ZUX. As a regular CD burner, it performs flawlessly, which is expected of any CD burner. It is external and therefore portable. The use of USB 2.0 port is an excellent choice as it will become the standard on new PCs.

I love the DiscT@2 feature and I would buy this drive just to use this feature alone. It is THAT cool. No other CDRW drive on the market can do what this drive can and that's saying alot about the technology behind this drive.

We use the Yamaha CRW to back up data files and since it's installation, it's been running about 10 hours a day. We have found it to be an excellent unit, despite the extremely heavy use it's been subjected to. After initial tests, I quit using it at its maximum copy speed - I was getting too many copy errors and dead discs. But if you take it down a couple of notches, it's still very fast and much more reliable.

The drive is easy to install and use. The software is intuitive and quick to learn. Very good value.

I can't vouch for those who have complications with this burner due to hardware or software conflicts, but with my Toshiba notebook running on Win98 SE, the burner burns like a sleek assassin churning out razorsharp steel like it's running from god. Quiet, efficient, flawless, as far as I can tell, everything is what I hoped for in this product. It's as if Yamaha and Nero just decided to give the consumer everything with no strings attached. For beginners (as I was before I researched), the burner will write CD-R at 8x (actually 6x) with USB 1.1 (the standard) and up to 44x with USB 2.0 (if you have 44x CD-Rs; if not 16x). Purchase a separate USB 2.0 Cardbus PC card for your notebook, but make sure you have 32-bit cardbus compatibility on your computer.

By the way, the DiscT@2 isn't solid. It really depends on your CD-Rs, I think. I can barely read the burned print on my CD-R. No big deal, though. Nice extra.