Product Reviews

The LaCie FireWire PocketDVD-RW is a DVD burner pared down to the bare minimum. It handles both DVD-R and DVD-RW discs, and can also burn to CD. The PocketDVD-RW creates DVD-R and RW at single speed and stores 4.7Gb of data per disc. It's primarily designed as a portable solution, but there's nothing to stop you using it with a desktop machine.

The PocketDVD-RW is certainly portable, being both compact and light. It's powered through the FireWire cable so there's no cumbersome power supply to add to the weight. The device's molded rubber surround may not be to everyone's taste but it gives the LaCie an air of ruggedness; the LaCie PocketDVD-RW could quite happily bounce around a backpack and come to no harm. The tray mechanism is sandwiched in place by the rubber and two metal plates to help the PocketDVD-RW keep its shape.

Rubber feat

Our only misgiving regarding the design is that the rubberised surround can be lifted up quite easily, so it's feasible that something might find its way into the internals of the drive. However, you would be very unlucky or have to be extremely heavy handed to do any real

Getting up and running with the PocketDVD-RW is simplicity itself: just plug in the FireWire cable, insert a disk and away you go.

If you want to use the bundled CaptyDVD software for making your own video DVDs, then it's worth noting the specifications require a G4 processor. However, we ran CaptyDVD on a G3 machine and it worked, albeit very slowly. On a G4, though, CaptyDVD is an excellent application that makes video DVD creation a breeze. CaptyDVD offers a full DVD authoring solution with menu-access chapter creation. It can also author video CDs for lower-quality video but quicker burning times.

Otherwise, the PocketDVD-RW is supplied with a cut-down version of Roxio's Toast, one of the most well-designed and useful applications available on the Mac. Unlike DVD-RAM, where you simply drag and drop files or folders onto the disc image on the Desktop, DVD-RW requires you to use software to burn your data. But, then, DVD-RW discs are cheaper and don't require a caddy.

The PocketDVD-RW performed well in our tests, and we found the CaptyDVD software intuitive and reliable. And the ability to power the drive via FireWire is extremely useful.

Carry it off

We're not quite sure the PocketDVD-RW is worth the money if you're thinking of buying it just to sit on your desk, as there are better solutions out there - for example, LaCie's own d2 DVD+/-RW, which is faster, supports DVD+RW and costs only £143.

However, if you need a portable DVD burner that can bounce, the LaCie PocketDVD-RW is certainly worthy of consideration. Its £214 price tag is a little high, but you should take in to consideration the bundled software and FireWire capability of the unit.