CompuServe Messages

Bob, NEC's position is this: They are not upgrading your existing drive, they are actually swapping your existing drive for a brand new one. They require you to return all materials from your original package (cables, drive, caddy, manual, etc…). They then refurbish your drive and resell it to a third party. So they claim you are getting a new drive at a great price. Now this is a highly debatable claim. Since most people will never use multi-session capabilty (any purchased ROM will probably always be single sessioned), and SCSI-II does little for CD ROMs about the only thing you are getting is a slightly larger cache (64k to 256k). Does this seem like its worth $250? I don't think so. I am sure NEC will have a new faster model out later this year. The Toshiba 3401 is a faster drive with better throughput for a cheaper price. For less than $200 more than the upgrade price you can purchase a Toshiba. You might be better off selling the NEC and using the money to purchase a Toshiba instead. The only reason NEC rushed the 74/84-1 to the market was because they were getting alot of requests for multi-session capability. I don't think it was really a planned model in their line. Its too bad as most people don't need multi-session capabilty to start with and is causing market confusion. I look for NEC to announce a 200ms drive (like the Toshiba) with a 300k/sec+ transfer rate later this year. You can purchase those right now from Toshiba but they can be hard to find. NEC does make high quality products. The NEC CDR-74 is not a bad drive. I would not upgrade it if I were you. Jay Cahow Cahow Consulting