Hi,
I think that as long as it fits in the same mounting hardware, and the interface is the same, pretty much any drive (from later models of PowerBook and early MacBooks/MacBook Pros with ATA optical drives, for example) should work without problems.
As for Apple-branded versus not, that's up to you. As far as I know, there's basically no difference aside from a bit of code in the drive's firmware that identifies it as an Apple OEM drive, which isn't present in non-Apple versions. You can use a non-Apple drive, though in certain cases (and I have yet to encounter any) some software might complain that the drive is non-Apple and therefore won't work (I think this is more likely in OS 9 and early versions of X; later versions of X, such as Tiger, have generic support for pretty much any drive, Apple or not, which makes this point moot).
I hope this helps...
c
I think that as long as it fits in the same mounting hardware, and the interface is the same, pretty much any drive (from later models of PowerBook and early MacBooks/MacBook Pros with ATA optical drives, for example) should work without problems.
As for Apple-branded versus not, that's up to you. As far as I know, there's basically no difference aside from a bit of code in the drive's firmware that identifies it as an Apple OEM drive, which isn't present in non-Apple versions. You can use a non-Apple drive, though in certain cases (and I have yet to encounter any) some software might complain that the drive is non-Apple and therefore won't work (I think this is more likely in OS 9 and early versions of X; later versions of X, such as Tiger, have generic support for pretty much any drive, Apple or not, which makes this point moot).
I hope this helps...
c