Peripheral maker MCE Technologies LLC announced Tuesday that they’re shipping their internal 2x DVD-RW + DVD-RAM drive upgrade for PowerBook G4s. The company is actually shipping the product about two weeks ahead of schedule — when MCE announced the drive last week, the company suggested that the drive wouldn’t start shipping until the 18th.
The new drive enables PowerBook G4 users to replace their existing optical drives with a drive that can burn CD-R, DVD-R and DVD-RW media, along with DVD-RAM media. It’s compatible with the optical drives inside all 12-inch, 15-inch and 17-inch PowerBook G4s, though MCE levies an additional charge for units that will be installed in some older PowerBooks.
The new drive is compatible with iDVD and other popular DVD authoring applications, according to MCE Technologies. What’s more, it’ll work with Apple’s own Disc Burner and iTunes software and DVD Player as well. It ships with ImageMixer, a DVD authoring software application, as well as Roxio’s Toast Lite CD authoring software.
The drive burns DVD-R media at up to 2x speed, DVD-RAM media at up to 2x speed, and DVD-RW media at 1x speed. It also writes to CD-R media at up to 16x speed, CD-RW media at up to 8x speed. It can also read DVD-ROM discs at up to 8x speed and CD-ROM discs at up to 24x speed.
The suggested retail price for the new optical drive replacement is US$349 — $389 for PowerBook G4/400MHz and 500MHz models. MCE requires that the upgrade take place either at its facility or through an authorized upgrade center, and MCE maintains a list of such locations on its Web site.