Sorry... too bad shipping costs so much or I'd just send you one for here!

Pesto, I am about to purchase a DVD burner for my Gateway (bought in 2003),probably from Sam's club. Are they easy to install? I have a DVD drive but not a burner. Also have Easy CD Creator installed (an older version - 5 Platinum). Any advice?

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Did you know that I blog? Gypsy Gold Studio

Yes - they are quite easy. Depending on your case quality, you either have to screw the drive into the frame or better cases have a clamping system. If its the screw kind, you will need to remove the side panel on the case. Then, you would need to remove the plastic cover under the current DVD drive which exposes an empty 5.25 " bay. Then, you just slide the new DVD drive into the bay, line up the screw holes with the case holes and screw in the drive. Finally, its just a matter of attaching 2 cables: you will see a 4 prong cable with black, red and yellow wires - this is called a MOLEX cable and is the power. The other cable will be the wide greyish IDE cable that is currently attached to your DVD drive. In the middle of this cable is a black connector... you'll be attaching this to the new DVD drive.

After that, just put the side panel back on, boot up the PC and it should recognize your new DVD drive with a new drive letter. that's it.

Easy CD creator is ok.. but I'm not sure if it will burn DVD's.. The DVD burner will come with some software... I wouldn't spend a lot of $$ on any other.. they all do a decent job.

Let me know if this doesn't help or doesn'y make sense... I'd be glad to help further. It really is easy once you get in there! Good Luck!

Oh.. and just ran across this with pictures! It does talk about 2 add'l steps that aren't usually needed for DVD drives - attaching a audio cable (if you wanted to listen to CD's in this drive through your speakers) and setting it to a slave mode. you can do these steps if you'd like - they won't hurt anything but usually they aren't needed.

http://compreviews.about.com/od/tuto...s/DIYCDDVD.htm

Thank you. It may be a few days since I just walked back in the door with a computer for hubby. His bit the dust this afternoon. It was an oldie and not goody so it was due. He uses his computer to do word processing. And now to surf the internet since I will be finishing up networking them as soon as I get his new one up and running.

I'll let you know how it goes.

One more question, the burner I'm looking at is apparently a combo burner, CD and DVD. Is that good or bad or am I "misremembering" that it can do both?

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Did you know that I blog? Gypsy Gold Studio

DVD burners are normally combo - burn DVD's and CD's. I originally had a cd reader drive and a cd burner. I then replaced the cd burner with a DVD/CD burner and then the regular cd reader bit the dust so we put the cd burner back in and use that as a cd reader instead of using the dvd/cd burner for everything. The cd burner fires up quicker so we use it for games that require the cd. It's just means less wear and tear on the dvd burner.

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Kim

Cool! That's exactly what I needed to know (and I'm glad to hear it!). Thanks so much.

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Did you know that I blog? Gypsy Gold Studio

correct.. they all do both these days. Good luck and let me know if you need assistance!