The Lite-On eTAU208 USB DVD/CD Writer is a slim and light disc burner. Best of all, it’s USB powered, which means you don’t need to carry around a separate power cable. Just plug it into your netbook, insert a disc, and the DVD burner powers up.

As someone with a huge USB DVD burner that’s pretty much anchored to my desk, I love being able to just throw a light weight disc drive in my bag when I might need it on the go. The eTAU208 can get a little noisy, and the plastic case feels a little flimsy. But I wouldn’t really expect much more from a portabl DVD burner that sells for as little as $50.

Lite-on sent me an eTAU208 disc drive to review in October, and now that I’m done with it I’m ready to pass it on to one Liliputing reader.

This contest is open to readers anywhere in the world. To enter, first read the official contest rules and then leave a comment below letting me know what you currently do in order to transfer data to and from a netbook without an optical disc drive.

This contest will run through 12:01AM Eastern Time on December 5th.

The last USB DVD burner from Lite-On that I checked out was the slim, light, and USB bus-powered eTAU208. It’s a good solution for someone looking for a portable disc burner for under $50. The company’s latest entry into the USB DVD burner space isn’t as light, portable, or cheap. But it’s fast.

The new Lite-On eHAU424 can burn DVDs at 24x speeds, making it one of the fastest USB DVD burners around. It also includes LightScribe technology for labeling discs. But it doesn’t run on USB bus power, which means you’ll have to lug around a power cable. And it’s a bit chunkier than the eTAU208, which means you’re less likely to shove this drive in your bag on your way out of the house.

The eHAU424 has an MSRP of $69.99, but you can pick it up now for about $55.

The Lite-On eTAU208 DVD/CD Writer is a portable disc drive that’s pretty handy for folks who like to travel light. Not only is the DVD burner barely any wider than an optical disc, it also weighs just 0.77 pounds. And it draws power from you’re computer’s USB port, which means there’s no extra power cable to lug around.

The folks at Lite-On sent me a demo unit to review, and so far it seems to perform exactly as described. One thing I really like is that the disc burner comes with a short USB cable that can be tucked into a slot on the bottom of the disc drive for easy storage. It took a little bit of effort to cram the USB cable into place, but it sure beats misplacing the cable or having yet another separate item to throw in your bag.

When you plug the disc drive into a PC, it should be recognized almost immediately. If you want to shut down the drive while it’s still plugged in, just hit the Stop button and it will power down. You can power it up again by opening and closing the lid.

I was also pleased to note that when I plugged the disc drive with an HP Mini 5101 and powered up the netbook I was able to hit F9 and choose the eTAU208 from the boot options menu, which means that you don’t need to wait for your operating system to load before your PC will recognize the drive.

Lite-On ships the disc drive with Nero 8 Essentials disc burning software for Windows and Linux.

On the down side, the disc drive has a cheap plastic feel to it, but that’s probably because it is made of cheap plastic. But that’s also one of the reasons it’s so light weight.

The Lite-On eTAU208 has a list price of $64.99, but you can pick it up from Newegg for $49.99 + free shipping. You can check out some unboxing photos after the break.

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While I wouldn’t say the lack of an optical disc drive is necessarily a defining feature of a netbook, the truth is that most 10 inch and smaller laptops lack disc drives because there’s just not much room for them. This also helps keep the price down, and cuts back on the number of moving parts that can break, so all in all, I’m pretty happy with the current state of affairs. But sometimes you still need a disc drive to install software, copy data, or view media.

There are a number of USB DVD drives out there, but the new Lite-On eTAU108 is a pretty slick looking one that would go great next to most netbooks. The slim DVD burner is top-loading, which means there’s no slide-out tray. It can be powered by a USB port, which means fewer cables to carry around. And it weighs less than 0.8 pounds.

The eTAU108 runs about 45 Euros or $64 US. I could be wrong, but I’m pretty sure Lite-On is selling the same disc drive as the eTAU208 in the US. I haven’t seen a US price for this model yet though.

via Netbook News.de