Samsung SE-506BB/TSBD 6X USB2.0 External Slim Blu-ray Writer Drive (Black)

Small, slim, slick-looking external Blu-Ray drive, with the typical Samsung digital device quality and value (currently $89 here). No issues so far from the device, automatically recognized by Windows 7 64, and installed the CyberLink Media software suite from the included disc. I also like the "swipeable" eject button of sorts, that leads to less wear and tear, and is easy to open and close. The unit itself is perfectly solid, but light weight and meant to be handled gently.I purchased this drive for my PC predominately, to both play Blu-Ray movies on it, and more importantly to take advantage of the 25 GB's of space BR discs have, so that I could back-up my media files, and also play them on my HDTV's that have Blu-Ray players (both recognize most codec's).Important points for those new to Blu-Ray Writers:You will only be able to watch newer BD+ encrypted, and many encrypted Blu-Ray movies in general, using "commercial" software like PowerDVD 10. Make sure to upgrade with the patch you'll find a link to in the settings menu immediately. (prior to that I received an error) VLC and other free players will not work for those. PowerDVD works just fine for me, especially in "Cinema Mode."Burn your media files (.mkv, .mp4, .avi etc..,) to a BD-R disc as a "data" disc and use that mode on your other Blu-Ray players in order to play them back on your HDTV's. (just like putting a USB flash drive in a BR player, not a regular Blu-Ray movie disc)With those two bits of information, I was able to quickly both play and burn/back-up all of my media files fairly quickly and finally watch anything I have on my PC, conveniently on my other two Blu-Ray players in other rooms.A worthwhile, fun purchase I now am patting myself on the back for doing, allowing me to watch and take BR and/or high-def digital movies anywhere I go.

I have a 5 year old MacBook Pro which is still going strong. The optical drive works well, but I wanted Blu-Ray capability. So I bought this item. I downloaded and paid for MacGo Blu-Ray player (software) and voila my MBP is now a full-fledged Blu-Ray player -- which, incidentally, unlike my Denon dedicated BD player does not take 5 minutes to load the disc. It loads like a CD or DVD and nothing on my non-Retina screen has ever looked so good :)Some have said this item won't play BD's on a Mac. Absolutely not so -- BUT you need the software to make it work. Why they didn't include that on the enclosed disc, I can't imagine. Macs have no built in Blu-Ray capability so the 3rd party software is essential.Ripping a BD for backup takes about 4 times longer than a DVD and processing it to play on an Apple TV (for example) also takes about 4 times as long -- all of which makes sense since BD has up to 10 times as much data to process -- so I don't think I'll be doing THAT very often. That is not a fault of this drive but simply the nature of the HD format.Finally, some have noted that the drive was "flimsy". Well, I don't agree with THAT either. It "feels" just like a built in optical drive on a Dell or Toshiba (or HP) Laptop. I think it is well built for what it is and what it is intended to be. It is lightweight and it is good looking. I have used it on both my MBP and a MacMini that I also own. It really is Plug-and-Play (providing you have installed the proper BD software). For CD's or DVD's it is plug-and-play out of the box. AND if you use the "Burn Folder" feature of Mac OSX it will also burn a data disc -- out of the box. If you want to "author" an optical video disk (DVD or BD) you'll need Roxio Toast.I wish my car unit were BD capable. If it were I could put enough music on a single disk to drive thousands of miles.Bottom Line: This is a beautiful little drive that does exactly what it is supposed to do. Add the proper processing software to it and it is a complete CD/DVD/BD solution. If I were the owner of a Laptop without a built-in optical drive, this would be the drive of choice.