I'm using an HP 9200i internal SCSI CDRW. It's not a bad drive I don't think. I haven't had problems with other mediums due to the drive (always the software).

That photo album sounds cool, but of course, I'll need to get VCDs working at all before I try any creative uses!

The thing that really amazed me about Nero was the encoding of the WMV file without any problem at all! That was absolutely amazing! Most programs I'v efound that are designed specifically for converting files can't do stuff like that!