my 2 cents... i burn cd's at 48x no problems at all as for dvd's i burn at 8x or 16x for data, now for video it is best not to burn at maximum. I have 2 burners, one is a "BackPack" usb burner and works like a charm, so if you don't want to or know how to install a burner, i highly recommend it. That one burns at 4x, but never a bad one in the bunch. Boy was it ever nice to go from loads of poser related cd's to 4 dvd's