Early adopters, more often than not, are always on the lookout for the latest and greatest piece of technology or hardware in order to stay ahead of the pack no
matter the cost. HP's new HD-DVD drive is one such example. Connected to the computer via a High-Speed USB 2.0 port, the HD100 DVD-ROM will be released at the end of the year and signals the change of camps for HP from Blu-ray to HD DVD. You will need some serious muscle in your computer to play back and decode HD content, at least a Pentium D 840 3.2GHz or an AMD 64 X2 2.2GHz is the bare minimum. The graphics processing unit is not spared either - you must own either the NVIDIA GeForce 7600GT or an ATI X1600. Make sure you are equipped with a HDMI or HDCP-compliant DVD-D connection as well. Performance figures of the HD100 DVD-ROM is pretty impressive, read speeds are clocked in at 2.4x, 5x, and 14x for HD DVD, DVD, and CD respectively. There will be no LightScribe capability with this USB-powered drive.Pros : You can now watch HD DVD movies and media on your PC
Cons : Most probably expensive, requires a pretty powerful computer to decode HD DVD
HP reveals HD100 DVD-ROM Source
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