Let's start with the bad then end of with the good:
1. Yamaha never sent me the rebate that was advertised with the burner. So, it makes this burner a little more pricey than others
2. The burning software is a little bit buggy and often does an illegal operation and shuts down. however, it hasn't really affected it too much because it usually does the error when you are shutting it down anyway.
3. I often lose sound on my regular cd drive when playing discs and on the hard drive when playing music. but that could be my own computer's fault.
4. I bought the drive thinking i could use it with headphones since it's portable. well, you need an outlet to get power, so it's not something you can use to run off of batteries. I also thought it could store MP3's, which it doesn't, but that's pretty much my own ignorance when it comes to these things.

Ok, so the good things:

1. it was really easy to install
2. it records music very quickly
3. the sound quality is good
4. you can plug it into a receiver and play CD's that way without having to buy a separate cd player for your stereo.

well, anyway, I hope this helps!