I recently bought a COMPRO (Matsushita) CD recorder or CD burner, who happened to be burned out itself in less than 3 months, or less than 20 CDs, whatever comes first. It costed (in Argentina) 420.- pesos = 420.- dollars.
My advice, buy always only first quality (may be Hewlett Packard ? - I can't assure), and buy only first quality blank disks too. Poor ones do not get correctly recorded.
Yours, Andrés