Yamaha Electronics Corp. is now shipping their new Mac compatible CD-RW drives.
The external USB 2.0 model CRW-F1ZUX is shipping and will be available at an estimated street price of US$229.99. The Mac/PC compatible external dual interface, FireWire & USB 2.0 model CRW-F1ZDX will ship the first week of September and be available for an estimated street price of $279.99. The external SCSI model CRW-F1ZSX will ship the second week of September and be available for an estimated street price of $329.99.
All CRW-F1 series of optical recorders offer the DiscT@2 Laser Labeling System, which burns graphics and text onto CD-R discs, eliminating the need for labels. Yamaha said that the CRW-F1 also offers the first ever 24X CD-RW ReWriting with Mt. Rainier support and the CD-RW Audio Track Edit system; Safe-Burn buffer underrun prevention technology with 8MB of buffer memory; the PurePhase Laser System that reduces jitters while recording by 25 percent; a dynamic damper system to reduce noise and vibration; and Advanced Audio Master Quality Recording System for mastering studio-quality audio and data CDs.
The new CRW-F1 also sports the jitter suppressing Full-CAV (Constant Angular Velocity) writing technology, the adaptation of which purportedly enables the Yamaha CRW-F1 to burn a full 80-minute CD-R disc in 163 seconds. It comes with Dantz Retrospect backup software and Roxio’s Toast 5 Lite.
The drive’s external design features a florescent white on/off indicator light, as well as an elongated blue LED indicator. The enclosure is designed to be stackable for multiple unit connectivity.