May 22 - 6:30pm EDT   Other World Computing on Thursday unveiled low-cost Superdrives for almost any Mac released within the last decade, offering 48x CD burning and LightScribe labeling technology. OWC claims the drives are quiet, and do not require any extra software to be installed with the drive. Users can also write to dual-layer DVDs at up to 12x speeds, while single-layer discs can write at up to 20x. OWC is selling the Superdrives starting from $35. [full story]

February 14 - 1:30pm EST   Other World Computing (OWC) today unveiled new Superdrives and CD burners for all Mac computer models. The company's drive upgrade -- the 20X DL SuperDrive DVR-115D -- reads as well as writes DVDs, CDs, and dual-layer DVDs. Capacity for dual layer DVDs is 8.5GB at speeds of 10X; regular DVDs for 4.7GB capacity at 20X; and CDs for 700MB at 40X. "For most Macs, this is an incredibly easy upgrade and one of great return for anyone who's currently making or planning to make their own DVDs or CDs," OWC said. The new drives are priced from $30 and up. [full story]

January 11 - 10:50am EST   NewTech Infosystems today released NTI Dragon Suite, a collection of three Mac applications to handle disc burning as well as data compression and backup. NTI Dragon Burn features patented multi-burning technology that supports internal as well as external drives for simultaneously creating multiple copies of a CD or DVD. The software includes support for burning the leading video, audio, photo, and data formats onto the latest optical discs -- such as 16x DVD-R drives and 8.5GB DVD+R Double Layer (DL) media. NTI Dragon Suite is priced at $80, and requires Mac OS X 10.3.9 or later. [full story]

January 10 - 12:50pm EST   Fujitsu has promised to showcase its newest ScanSnap Scanner for Mac at the Macworld 2008 Conference and Expo from January 14-18 in San Francisco, CA. The company also said it will announce a forthcoming device to address the mobile document imaging needs of the Mac community. Fujitsu's new ScanSnap S510M is one of the only single-pass duplex automatic document feeder (ADF) scanners available today for the Apple community, according to the company, and comes bundled with ABBYY FineReader 3.0 optical character recognition (OCR) software. Live demonstrations of the S510M will take place at booth no. S308. [full story]

December 14 - 4:05pm EST   FastMac today unveiled a 4x Dual Layer Blu-Ray optical drive upgrade (site not updated) for Apple's Mac Pro and Power Mac G5 workstations. The 5.25-inch tray loading drive uses one of the fastest Mac-compatible Blu-ray mechanisms, according to the company, providing up to 50GB of storage on one dual or dual or double layer disc without sacrificing compatibility with standard DVD or CD media. Utilizing SATA connectivity, the drive's BD-R DL feature allows Mac users to burn a complete 50GB disc in under 50 minutes. The drive is already available for an introductory price of $600, and comes with a 1-year warranty. [full story]

November 30 - 11:30am EST   Recently published by the US Patent and Trademark Office is an application from Apple, relating to optical disc drives. Originally submitted on May 22nd, 2006, the application details an an improvement to slot-loading drives, which allows them to play smaller-sized three-inch discs, in addition to regular-sized five-inch ones. Normally, only tray-loading drives can play both. The application is attributed to iPod engineer Anthony Fadell, who has devised two possible adapters: one with two folding halves, and another in which four sections lock together. [full story]