General computer use without an optical drive?

HAVOC · 15 Feb 2013

I did some work on my system yesterday and I removed my DVD/RW drive along with some cable management. Now that you can buy alot of software online and install it without the need for an optical drive, is one even needed anymore?

I have an external DVD/RW (USB2) that I occasionally use with my netbook. Can I use that to install Windows and other software that I still have a disk for (3 or 4 programs)? I'll also use it to burn ISO's (Linux) should I need to.

maxie · 15 Feb 2013

Do not need a dvd drive to install Windows as you say many netbooks do not have one any how

Alejandro85 · 15 Feb 2013

It depends on your needs, but I see that it's being left alone more and more after each day. Almost every program now gets downloaded though internet and not have a CD, drivers often the same even though a CD is normally shipped with devices. Maybe watching DVD movies on the computer or to download a movie and burn a disc out of it, or for backup purposes.
In my notebook, my DVD drive stays unused for most things except for some rescue disk I use sometimes.

ICIT2LOL · 15 Feb 2013

Hum Havoc I use mine a fair bit for burning music disks for spares and in the car etc and I find it really handy for booting ISO's too (if need be).

I know you can do that with sticks but call me old fashioned I like the disks because the smallest stick I see around these days is 4GB and I don't like "cluttered" sticks:).

Britton30 · 15 Feb 2013

Nowadays anything a CD/DVD drive can do is also possible with a USB flash drive, other than burning a disk of course. One would be needed to install a LAN driver on a new build too unless you saved it on a USB drive downloaded on another machine.

I put a floppy drive in a PC two builds back, never had any occasion to use it and I suspect optical drives will soon be a "what's that thing" item.

M1GU31 · 15 Feb 2013

I still use mine for windows installs and burning music cds for my car or making copies of other cds i have that are important to me and some other software i have that i bought in the past to install. I say they are still useful but just not needed as often anymore.

HAVOC · 15 Feb 2013

Would an external drive (USB2) operate at the same speeds as an internal (SATA) drive (ex. would it take longer to install Windows)?

I do have some DVD's that I'd like to rip to my HDD incase something happens to the original. If internal is faster, I guess I should keep it.

Britton30 · 15 Feb 2013

USB 2.0 has a theoretical throughput of 480Mbs while SATA II is 3Gbs and SATA III is 6Gbs. In real use one usually gets roughly 1/4 to 1/3 of these speeds.
The bottle neck may be the output speed of an optical drive being the same no matter how it is attached. I'm not sure if it is always the same since the disks spin at a constant 220RPM.

AddRAM · 15 Feb 2013

Play cd`s dvd`s , there are lots of reasons to have one.

Fantail · 15 Feb 2013

Well I need my opticals. Not as much as I used to, mostly just for an occasional movie.