Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I got this drive to make DVD backups of my picture collection so that I don't lose all of my pictures if a hard drive crashes, a thief makes off with my laptop, or a flood wipes out everything in my house (I store a copy off-site). I purchased this drive because of the reviews, the price, the m-disc compatibility, and because it works with both Windows and Macs. It turned out to be the perfect choice. I first used it with my Windows 8.1 laptop to burn both regular and m-disc DVDs to back up my pictures and videos. There are reviews that say that this product cannot be used on Windows 8 without purchasing an expensive program, but that is not true. First of all, when you insert the CD that comes with the drive, there is the option to download a program for free that will play DVDs on Windows 8. If that is not what you want or you can't get it to work for whatever reason, there are a lot of very good programs available for free that do the same thing. There's no reason to pay a lot of money for something that you get for free. Here are two good articles that will help those of you needing help with how to do this: http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-8/play-dvds http://www.howtogeek.com/127774/how-to-play-dvds-on-windows-8/ This drive is wonderful, and even if it didn't come with free software that allows you to watch DVDs on your Windows 8 machine, it's not their fault that Microsoft didn't include a basic program in Windows 8. These reviews should reflect the actual product, and should not be based on somebody's anger at something that has nothing to do with the product. This product is wonderful, works perfectly, has high end capabilities at a low end price and even comes with software to view DVDs on Windows 8 as well. Unless you are using this for something more than what the average user needs, you really can't go wrong.