Customer Reviews:
Showing reviews 1-5 of 6
 A great Bluray drive August 24, 2010
Stuck (Rhode Island)
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
After spending almost 4 months weighing the pros and cons of upgrading my PC to be bluray enabled, I finally jumped the gun when I found this drive.
The drive is a BULK item, which means it comes with the drive only. No cables, no manual, no instructions, but this DOES INCLUDE BLURAY SOFTWARE. It comes with PowerDVD8 Bluray Edition, which works fine on my Windows 7 32-bit machine.
The drive itself is very quiet, and loads Blurays very quickly. It has a nice black finish on the front, and looks great in my tower. Installation was quick and simple, after finding a SATA cable laying around, I slid it into my tower and hooked it up. I then booted my computer, and the drive was instantly recognized by Windows 7 and was ready to use. I then installed the included PowerDVD8 software and rebooted again. 1 minute later my computer was bluray ready! Please note that the included software ONLY PLAYS 2.1 SOUND. You have to upgrade for ~50 dollars to have 5.1 sound! This won't affect most, but if you have a home theater you will need to consider the cost of the upgrade when ordering this drive if you want full 5.1 sound.
As for the difference between DVD and bluray, it IS noticeable for sure. I played the same movie on my two monitors, one DVD, and one Bluray and there was a big difference in visual quality! It is definitely worth the 60 dollars to upgrade to Bluray!
NOTE: When you first install the PowerDVD8 software, it has you run a Bluray compatibility checker. This failed for me the first time and had me kind of worried. I then updated the software and ran the checker again and it PASSED. Just make sure to update the software before running the checker!
 Silent drive - perfect for HTPC! August 24, 2010
rbhatta (Sunnyvale, CA, USA)
Lite-On 4X SATA Blu-ray ROM Drive IHOS104 is an excellent choice for any HTPC owners due to it's super silent operation and good enough read speeds for Blu-Ray media.
I put this on a old dell machine which I use as a media center PC and I am happy to report that it works like a charm.
The included Cyberlink PowerDVD software for windows XP/Vista/Windows7 is good enough for Blu-Ray movies with 2-channel Stereo output to begin with and if you wish to have DD5.1/DTS channel audio output to your Audio Receiver you will have to upgrade the software.
PROS
[+] Silent operation
[+] Good read speeds for single layer and dual layer BD media
[+] Good compatibility with various BD and DVD/CD media
CONS
[-] Included software can do 2 channel Stereo output if you want DD5.1/DTS audio, you need to upgrade software for additional cost from Cyberlink
[-] No SATA cables or SATA power cables provided
Despite this I highly recommend this drive as it does what the specs say and with this price you can jump into Blu-ray bandwagon easily (With few additional software purchases)
Blu-ray Picture quality is superb, Trust me, In the end it makes all the effort worthwhile.
Note: For smoother Blu-ray playback, you need to have a Dual-Core or better CPU and a good Quality Graphics card which is HDCP capable to go along with HDCP capable Monitor or you will be forced to use VGA (Analog) connection.
Great product, works extremely stable August 9, 2010
David Liu
Make long story short,
I'm 100% happy with this BD reader, I have two of them, software installed easily,
works great with no bug.
Some previous build I used other brand BD drive, it keeps on blocking my HDMI audio out from ATI 5750/5830 video card,
but the Lite-on BD does not do that.
Installed easily, works great.
Great blu ray, especially for the price August 8, 2010
Jason L. Hoffman (Folsom, CA United States)
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
I finally decided to take the blu ray plunge by adding a blu ray drive to my HTPC. This drive was inexpensive but still had solid reviews, so I took a chance. I couldn't be more pleased. The drive was installed and working in a matter of minutes, the PowerDVD software included works perfectly, and the playback is amazing.
Great bang for the buck!
Easy install & great price July 29, 2010
D. Witt
5 out of 5 found this review helpful
I bought this for the first PC I built. Very easy installation. This drive is a great bang for your buck.
The only word of caution, this is the OEM version of the drive. It does not come with the Serial ATA cable needed to connect to your motherboard. Luckily my motherboard came with extra cables but that is something to consider when purchasing. But you can get a 18in SATA cable on amazon for a couple dollars so it's not a big deal.
Showing reviews 1-5 of 6
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