Lite-on today announced what it claims is the fastest DVD rewriter yet.

The SOHW-1673S internal drive provides 8x DVD+RW and 6x DVD-RW rewriting speeds, the company said. The drive also handles DVD-R and DVD+R at 16x, and dual-layer DVD+R at 4x.

The unit connects over an Atapi/E-IDE interface, and incorporates a 2MB data buffer. It also features "floating double suspension systems" to reduce drive noise and vibration. The drive uses Lite-on's SmartBurn buffer underrun error prevention code and its Smart-X speed optimisation software. Lite-on will also bundle an array of DVD authoring and disc burning software, including PowerDVD, Nero Express 6 and Nero Vision Express.

The SOHW-1673S is available now for £65. From May Lite-on will bundle in the extra bezel set. The set will include black as well as standard white frontpieces.

Lite-on also said it will follow up today's launch with an external, USB 2.0 version of the drive, the SOHW-1673SX. ®

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