Internal DVD±RW vs. External DVD±RW?

[skfields01]

I have a question that I cannot seem to find an answer anywhere. I am considering buying another DVD-RW drive. I was looking at the 2 following drives...

Sony (Internal) DRU-530 DVD±RW Drive
Sony (External) DRX-530 DVD±RW Drive - USB 2.0/Firewire

They are the same exact drive except one is Internal and the other is External. My question is... which is going to be faster for me from ripping (DVD Decrypter) to burning (CloneDVD2/Nero)? Is Internal (EIDE) faster or slower than External USB 2.0?

[smiller667]

Assuming the internal IDE connector can utilize the full speed of the drive (i.e. no dma problems or crappy chip with low transfer rates), the external one is never going to be faster, simply because an IDE-USB (or firewire)-bridge is involved.

The only question is: is the external one going to be significantly slower? Depends on the enclosure and the chip they are using ...