Recently, the Macworld Lab received a few DVD burners to test and review. All three of the drives we’re testing come with LightScribe, a laser-based disc-labeling technology. As we discussed the products and their various features, we began wondering about the importance of LightScribe to you, the Macworld reader.
For those unfamiliar with LightScribe, it’s a technology developed by HP that etches grayscale images onto the back of CD and DVD media. It requires special hardware in the drive and special LightScribe media, as well as LightScribe label design software.
When LightScribe was introduced about four years ago, LaCie had exclusive rights to distribute the software necessary for the creating labels on a Mac. Nowadays, you can buy LightScribe drives from other companies like Other World Computing, and you can download the necessary software directly from LightScribe’s Web site. Other companies, like SmileOnMyMac, now offer software to help design the LightScribe labels.
There’s no denying that laser-etching labels on your CDs and DVDs is a cool trick. The thing is that, even with LightScribe drives and media readily available around the lab, I’ve never bothered to create even one of these labels, except for when I’m testing the drives. It’s just so much easier to use a Sharpie. Am I alone on this?
That’s not a rhetorical question. We’d like to find out what our readers think of LightScribe. So let the following questions guide your responses in the attached forum thread:
- Have you ever made a LightScribe label?
- Would you consider LightScribe a must-have feature?
- Would you pay extra for a LightScribe drive?
We’d love to get your feedback and hear about your experience with LightScribe.