Almost all of the cables included with drives we tested had USB Type-A connectors on the computer’s end, but the inclusion of a USB-C cable or a USB-A–to–C adapter in the box is a nice bonus. On the drive’s end, we prefer the still-common Micro-USB port, though the larger Mini-USB is fine too (optical drives with USB-C ports are rare to nonexistent). Connector and cable: Drives should use standard detachable USB cables so that a frayed or broken cable doesn’t ruin the entire drive.
Noise: All optical drives make noise, but the drive shouldn’t drown out the movie or show you’re trying to watch.
Price: A good DVD drive shouldn’t cost more than $40, and a good Blu-ray drive should cost around $100. TROPRO External 3D Blu ray CD DVD Drive, Portable USB 3.0 and Type-C Blu-ray CD/DVD+/-RW Burner Player Writer Reader Rewriter for PC Netbook Laptop Desktop with Mac OS Windows XP/7/8/10 Silver.But if you’re burning or ripping discs, the rate at which a drive can move data from your computer’s hard drive to the disc or vice versa becomes more important. Speed: If all you’ll use your drive for is playing discs, just about any drive you buy will perform similarly.We didn’t require Blu-ray drives to support reading and writing to Ultra HD (or UHD, or 4K) Blu-ray discs, but we considered it a nice bonus if you didn’t have to pay much more for that feature.