Reviews for Apple USB SuperDrive

Not sure quite why but only some of my DVDs work with this drive. Plays software fine but when it comes to DVDs that is a new story. It is quite annoying as a student teacher who is trying to use educational material that i payed good money for and it doesn't work. Can't use my optical drive to play the material I want to use. My DVDs work on my old DVD player fine and in my PlayStation and also checked for scratches. So if you are using this to watch movies off of, don't bother because i fine only some of my movies work.

It's not as easy as it should be to eject the disk because it doesn't include an eject button and the new computer doesn't include an eject button and I put a disk in to install software and can't get it out

It seems to spit out about 50% to 60% of the DVDs and CDs. Some of the discs were brand new and the others were close to perfect. I bought a different, cheaper drive and haven't had a problem.

This device has several limitations, such as when i need to burn a long length of movie, the video couldn't completely capture and display in the DVD player. I''d used it for less than 50 times, and now it become faulty. Its the most incredible part.

It's convenient and necessary seeing that most macs are loosing optical drives but it's about time apple adds blu-ray support.

My "superdrive" has eaten a music CD. It won't read and won't eject. I expected a lot more from an apple product!

The drive itself works fine, IF you have the correct computer. I purchased it for use with my Mac mini--which it claims to support. However, it only supports the NEWEST mac mini, the one with no internal optical drive. I spent 30 minutes online with an Apple support tech who tried hard to get my older Mac mini (which reads DVDs but can't write them) to work with the drive, which it recognized but would not use. Apparently no one told support about the new superdrive firmware that disables it when it detects ANY optical drive in a Mac mini.
So if you're buying a NEW Mac mini, go ahead with this device. But DO NOT BELIEVE THE PRODUCT DESCRIPTION THAT SAYS IT WORKS WITH "THE MAC MINI"--it only works with SOME (i.e. new, optical-diskless) Mac minis.
I've sometimes been upset at Apple design decisions (remember the Apple ///? The Macintosh Portable?) but this is the first time I've been burned by DECEPTIVE product descriptions.

Unless I am missing something, the superdrive requires a super close connection to the computer. I have 100 things that need to plug into my laptop via USB, and so I use hubs. But, the USB Superdrive will not function if plugged into a hub, even a powered one; not even a superpowered one.

So, it works, but I lose the use of 50% of my usb ports when I use it, and 95% of my USB functionality.

And, the cord is WAY too short. It's time to upgrade the unit to Thunderbolt and give it a daisy chain. If that costs too much, how about USB 3.0?

In any case, functional, but by no means award winning.

As for use and function this is something that should be included in a budget desktop or mobil computer model. Removing the internal Superdrive while a nifty idea for is OK but for others not a great idea.

I would have to agree with others in that the time to remove the internal card may have come for a mobil user who is after a very light mobil device, however there has been no reason to date to removing the Superdrive from the Mac Mini line. The current iMacs are advertised as sharing their internal Superdrive to the other Apple computers.

As far as looks go the unit is your typical Apple form and design to match the remaining products in the line up of current models. One major concern of the unit would be the USB cable and it's length. Having such a short cable requires the user to keep the Superdive extremely close to the machine one is using the device on. Was hoping to have this mounted under the desk or somewhere close to the keyboard and mouse for convenience but again apple does not design or look towards a user experience with an external device.

Overall the device does do what the old Superdrive did. I gave this a two star for no new advantages towards the trends Apple is currently headed. Improvements would be a longer cord as well as adding two Thunderbolt to daisy chain with the other devices for external storage.