Techwalla may earn compensation through affiliate links in this story. Learn more about our affiliate and product review process here.
If your computer has a DVD drive, or you buy an external one, it's good to know whether it's a DVD writer or simply a DVD reader. The difference is that a DVD reader can be used only to access data and video information on an existing DVD, while a DVD writer can be used to save new files and data to a DVD. If you don't have a DVD writer or don't want to work with DVDs, you may be able to use a USB memory stick or a cloud file transfer system instead.
Video of the Day
Many computers ship with drives that can read data or play movies from digital versatile discs, or DVDs. Often these drives can play other types of optical media, meaning discs read by laser light, including Blu-ray discs or compact discs. If your computer doesn't come with such a drive, you can buy one to physically install in your computer or buy an external one connected with a cable, often to a USB port.
