We are talking about IR diodes harvested from 20x DVD burners or CD burners capable of burning CDs at a speed from 48x or 52x. You won't be able to get more than 100mW (maybe a little more or maybe a lot more if it's a freak diode) from them when driving them at 150mA. (which seems to be a safe current for these diodes)
Ohhhh! CD Burners...
I missed something here :-/
I thought we were talking about the ones bought online...
Lol, i bought mine online and got about 250mW while driving it with 140mA.
I got the diode of eBay, it was probably a freak one... because the other ones i bought didn't go that high. The operating current was 110mA, and you would get around 220mW, then i pushed it to 140mA and got 250mW, and when i pushed it to 150mA, it died.