Information Today
Volume 17, Issue 9 • October 2000
Hewlett-Packard Releases New CD-RW Drives

Hewlett-Packard Co. (HP) has announced the release of a new lineup of advanced CD-RW drives. The range features high speeds and additional user-friendly software to allow the conversion of MP3 files to audio CDs. In addition, users are able to upload their music CDs to the Web and listen to them on their computers as the software converts from audio to MP3.

“As a pioneer of CD-RW and a leader in the market we’ve invested a lot of time in understanding our customer’s needs. We’ve developed a reliable, easy-to-use, high-speed kit, bundled with the type of software that consumers are asking for,” said Charlie Ball, HP’s CD-RW product manager. “Each CD-RW comes with extra media, CD labelers, and software to compose, record, and burn tunes onto CD, as well as a lot more.”

The latest models offer either an EIDE, SCSI, or USB interface and range from $237 to $349.

All HP CD-Writers now include MusicMatch Jukebox software designed to allow users to file digital music tracks and convert them from MP3 files to WAV files so they can be played on CD players in the car, at home, or at work. MusicMatch Jukebox also includes a connection to live Internet radio.

The high-end internal drives—9510i (IDE) and 9600si (SCSI)—and sleek external drives—8230e (USB) and 9600se (SCSI)—also include Sonic Foundry’s ACID software package. This software allows customers to create and record their own compositions using more than 600 loops of various music styles.

The midrange 9350i (IDE), as well as the high-end and external drives, include Broderbund Multimedia Organiser software. This software can be used to store digital images and create CD photo albums.

The top-of-the-line products—9510i, 9600si, and 9600se—provide the fastest performance, with a 12x write, 8x rewrite, and 32x read speed. According to the company, the new generation of high-speed drive writes 650 MB of data or 74 minutes of audio in less than 7 minutes and re-writes in less than 10 minutes. HP’s fast-format functionality also enables users to format their CD-RWs in minutes, according to the announcement.

All HP CD-Writers also include new CD-creation software, HP MyCD, which is powered by VERITAS and allows users to write CDs. Adaptec Direct CD provides the drag-and-drop functionality to move and order files. Also included in the bundle is HP’s backup software, which helps to safeguard data, picture, and audio files downloaded from the Internet, scanners, or digital cameras.

Source: Hewlett-Packard Co., Palo Alto, CA, 650/857-1501; http://www.hp.com.


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