The war over DVD recording standards will escalate Monday when Hewlett-Packard unwraps the details on its first DVD drive for PCs that lets people repeatedly record on discs. The DVD-writer dvd100i, ...

Optical drives are still practical for many users, whether to play old CDs and DVDs, install software, or create backups—especially with modern laptops, which are usually supplied without a drive.

Optical drives no longer come pre-installed in most PCs and laptops, yet they’re still indispensable for many users. Whether for playing old DVDs, installing ancient software from CDs, or burning data ...