This article started life as a review of Plextor's PlexWriter 40/12/40U external CD-R/RW drive, but no sooner had we finished playing with that than Plextor announced an even faster model, the PlexWriter 48/24/48U. The differences between the two are minimal - just the drive mechanism - so whether you're interested in the 40/12/40U or the 48/24/48U, the information here will be relevant.

As you'd expect, the difference in the names relates to the performance of the two drives. The 40/12/40U can read and write at 40-speed and re-write at 12-speed, while the 48/24/48U can... well, to state the obvious it can read and write at 48-speed and re-write at 24-speed. This is quite a performance difference, at least for the re-write mechanism. In practice, few people will notice the difference between 40-speed and 48-speed, especially as the both drives are clever enough to vary their read/write speeds to take account of potential errors.

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The drive we reviewed was housed in an external silver-coloured metal case; quite a stylish one, actually. It looks as though some thought has gone into the design. At the back there's an on/off switch, a USB 2.0 connection for the host PC - you can use older USB 1.1 ports instead but performance will suffer - and left and right audio output connectors. There's also a socket for the supplied mains transformer.

While the casing is silver, the drive mechanism itself is black. This looks good as a contrast to the silver case, but has a more practical application too, in that it helps prevent reflected laser light from interfering with the read/write process. To further assist the write process, there's a BURN-proof mechanism to prevent buffer under-runs, plus Plextor's PowerRec II system which varies the writing speed as necessary to suit the media being used.

As well as a pack of blank CD-R discs and one CD-RW disc, the box includes the necessary USB cable plus some utility software, Nero 5.5 CD authoring software and InCD for packet writing. The drive has a self-test switch at the back and can be flash upgraded if necessary.

The build quality and attention to detail of this product are good - there's even a piece of bent metal supplied so that you can eject discs manually if the power fails for some reason. The casing is well put together and feels durable and the drive mechanism does its job relatively quietly. All in all, this is a good solution for those who need an external rather than internal drive. The only real difference between the two models is the re-write speed, so your choice is likely to come down to that and the small matter of price.