http://www.zdnet.com/pcmag/issues/1507/pcmg0049.htm (PC Press Internet CD, 03/1996)

PC Magazine -- April 9, 1996

Micro Design International Inc.: Express Writer

M. David Stone

Micro Design International (MDI) targets its Express Writer package for archiving and backup in heavy-duty word processing environments such as law offices. The target market explains the lack of software support for anything but Yellow Book Mode 1 format. However, the relatively steep $2,195 list price ($1,800 street) makes it hard to justify those limitations, or the slow performance.

As tested, the Express Writer hardware is built around a Pinnacle drive, which according to MDI is manufactured by JVC. The drive can read and write at both 1X and 2X speeds. Be aware, however, that MDI plans to replace this drive mechanism within one or two months after this review is published. At this writing, MDI is evaluating two drives that offer 2X write speed with a 4X read speed. The company also plans to drop the price to about $1,200, which would make this a much more competitive package.

Along with the drive, the package includes only the power cord and software, although you can order it with a hard disk, SCSI card, and cable as well. If you have a SCSI card already installed and a cable on hand, setup consists of plugging in the power cord and cable, then installing the software.

MDI supplies its own software, your choice of either Express Writer 1.0 for Windows or Express Writer for OS/2 (we tested it with the Windows version). The program is easy enough to use, but limited. According to MDI, the drive supports Yellow Book Mode 1 and Mode 2 formats as well as Red Book audio. However, the software supports only Yellow Book Mode 1, which means that, among other limitations, you can't record audio. Also missing from the software is any easy way to copy a commercial CD.

These limitations mean the drive was suitable for only three of our tests. Unfortunately, it didn't perform well even on those. On the two tests that created an image file on-disk and then created the CD from the image file, the package took over 1 hour 49 minutes to index the files, and nearly 1 hour 48 minutes to create the image file. MDI says this is because we had 10,000 files in one directory, and the time would be less with the same files scattered over multiple directories. Creating the CD itself took just 19 minutes 2 seconds, which is typical for a 2X recorder.

On the third test, creating a CD on the fly, the package not only took just as long to index the files but failed to create the CD, with an error message that indicated a hardware failure. A replacement drive gave the same result, which suggests that the problem lies elsewhere. MDI was not able to reproduce the problem using its own set of test data.

All told, the Express Writer package has too many strikes against it. Even if the drive had managed to finish the third test, the time it takes to index the files would make it the slowest package by far. Factor in the price and the limited formats supported and it's just too easy to find a drive that does more, works faster, and costs less.

Express Writer. List price: $2,195. Micro Design International Inc., Winter Park, FL 32792; 800-228-0891, 407-677-8333; fax, 407-677-8365; http://www.microdes.com.

Suitability to Task

                    Power     Ease

Initial startup     Fair      Fair
Backup              Fair      Fair
Disk duplication    Poor      Poor
Format flexibility  Poor      Fair