Adding a LightScribe DVD/CD Drive to MacPro Early 2009

kirreip wrote:
I don't really know if you really want that but I have installed a light scribe capable bluray burner. (With bootcamp and windows I can also watch bluray movies). The drive works flawlessly in OSX with Toast 10. The drive is an LG drive (like the stock SuperDrive). It is called GGW-H20L. Google it if you are interested. The installation was easy too, as the new MacPro uses s-ata drives.

VERY helpful. It is good to know that you can read BD disk under Windows as I am thinking about installing it under Parallels. I suspect it would work there too. Leaving open to see if any other suggestions, but this has the ring of a long term winner.

I find some of the posts here less than helpful. This is a support forum for the use of Apple products. Apple sells non-Apple products in their store for use Apple products and some such as cables to extend the MiniDisplayPort have been discussed in several threads here, for example.

Some people including me have shown interest in adding a LightScribe capable drive to their machine. To suggest that posting such a thread in +Expanding your Mac Pro (early 2009+ is not germane begs the question of what expanding means. I would suggest a more collegial atmosphere.

Message was edited by: Russell Vaught

Agree fully. See my post below.

I purchased an internal drive, the LG Super Multi DVD Rewriter (GH22). I then installed it in the machine following BOTH the instructions that came with the drive and the manual for the Mac Pro. I did it in the following steps:

1) Power down computer.

2) Following LG's instructions, I removed the *+tray door+* cover leaving the *+front bezel+* on the drive. The original drive has a small cover, but I did not find one for this drive although I plan to hunt for one. Note: I could not get the drive to eject the tray so I simply plugged the drive into the computer, pushed the *computer start button*, the *disk eject* key, and the tray opened. I then turned off power to shut the computer down again and unplugged the drive.

3) Following the Mac Pro instructions, I removed the drive carrier from the computer and unplugged the drive from the cable. I installed the new drive in the lower slot and reinstalled the carrier with both drives. The extra screws are on the carrier.

4) Powered on the computer and used +*System Profiler+* to confirm that both drives were connected successfully. The new drive showed up with +Generic Drive Support+ for burning. I did a test burn and the drive worked.

One problem I had was trying to figure out how to open the original drive as the new drive became the default.
a) To open the upper drive, which is the GH41N that ships with the computer, press *option+disk open* keys.
b) To open the new drive, press the *disk open key*.

Toast Titanium 10 comes with Disk Cover RE, which will write both inkjet and LightScribe labels. You can also purchase Disk Cover as a stand alone program if you do not want Toast. I have used Toast for years so I used the version that came with it.

direwolf8 wrote:
My point is that it's not a universal feature on computers in general, and it's not listed in any of the Apple specs, so it seems odd to me that anybody would assume it would be a standard feature. Apple never included the disct@2 technology for labeling disks that was a proprietary feature of Yamaha drives. One could just as easily express surprise that the Mac Pro doesn't have SAS drive support, serial and parallel ports, and GPIB support, but I'd still wonder where you got the notion that they did or should.

I'm sorry if you didn't find this helpful, but I think it was a superfluous question since Lightscribe support isn't mentioned anywhere in Apple's specs.

As to Apple specs, I make no assumption that it should be a standard feature, but this is a forum on +expanding function+ of my Apple computer. Surely you do not suggest that Apple is like some other vendors who expect that users should have somebody else do their thinking?

It is a feature that I, as the owner of the computer, choose to have. Apple may license parts of it to me and it may come with license restrictions, but it is my computer and if I want to add function, I will do so.

When PARC had the motto of "don't mode me in", I resonated to it. And I like open source software and open standards, but I will not let ANY vendor including Apple "mode me in" with their specs. As for Apple, they certainly have their share of proprietary features so if I wanted to be pure as snow I would run only LINUX. Oops, there is proprietary stuff there too if you look closely enough.

Most of the multimedia disks I create have inkjet labels on them. I wanted a second drive and LightScribe was frosting on the cake; not the reason for adding a drive. The end product does not look as good as my ink jet labels, but it is less easily damaged. While I archive most things offsite with a service, I do like to have a physical copy stored offsite as well. That is where most if not all of the LightScribe disks will go.

I found as has been discussed on the ROXIO forum that the LightScribe drivers that come with from ROXIO are not compliant with Mac OS 10.5. I downloaded the drivers from HP's LightScribe site and they did work.