I for one find it exasperating how much time DVDs (and CDs) spend spinning up and generally clicking about whilst for some reason simultaneously freezing the rest of the computer. I bet most HN readers know the reason, but, come on, we shouldn't have to be inconvenienced like this :-)

I haven't found an OS yet that reliably writes to DVDs. If I write a bunch of pictures to a DVD, I need to check afterwards that they're all present and correct. This can't just be down to my level of competence. It's a scandal.

Sometimes they spin at high revs so there's a virtual hair dryer in the background while I watch my videos. Or they go slooww and cannot be coaxed to copy my files in less than 103 minutes.

And they scratch quite easily too!

I wish we had something like those elegant crystals that Superman drops into slots to access the Kryptonian archive. Some kind of optical flash linkage ought to do the trick.