At last, a drive manufacturer has been brave enough to say speed isn't everything.

Plextor's new Plexwriter 48x 48/24/48A is billed as the world's fastest CD reader/writer drive with an access time of less than 65 milliseconds and, according to Plextor, that is about as fast as you need to go.

When reading CDs, you have to go slow enough to gather the data. Too fast and the drive makes mistakes.

Faster than 40x and the drive becomes unpleasantly noisy and potentially dangerous. There has been an instance where a badly scratched CD spun at speeds in excess of 40x exploded in the drive.

Plextor's research suggests a speed plateau has been reached. At more than 40x, the manufacturer claims, there is virtually no gain for most users so it has set the 48x model to run at 40x unless intentionally adjusted.

The device is able to write a complete CD in less than three minutes.

Like previous Plextor models, it is fitted with a black tray to reduce the amount of jitter when writing to a CD and is available with both black and white front panels.

The drive is supplied as a complete kit containing all the bits and pieces needed to fit it into a desktop computer case.

The job is fiddly but not excessively difficult so DIY could be an excellent and cost-effective way to add functionality to your computer.

Price: £95.

Contact: 0870 4293010.

Feel good factor: 9 out of 10.