DVR drive recomendations?

[Bouncing Zabaglione Bros.]

I've noticed that DVR drives have been getting very cheap recently - anyone have any recommendations, experience or gotchas to look out for?

I've been leaning towards the Pioneer DVR107, (or the more expensive XL version), or the NEC ND2500a. I've also had previously good (but expensive) experience with Plextor CD writers, so I'd consider their DVR drives too.

 

[rainz]

Plextor is the way to go ! my opinion.

RainZ

 

[Bouncing Zabaglione Bros.]

Plextor is the way to go ! my opinion.

RainZ

But they are double the price for the simarly specced Pioneer (and Pioneer drives are no slouch either).

Edit: While the PX-712 is good, for that price I'd expect it to write dual layer discs, as the equivalent Liteon and NECs do.

 

[mczak]

There was a review of 8x DVD burners recently in c't. In contrast to lots of other reviews, they actually measured burn quality (in audiodev lab), with several media. The results are IMHO horrible, almost all drives failed the quality test with several different media. The key issue here seems to be that the firmware really must know the media manufacturer/type, but since a new generation of drives appear every few weeks the manufacturer don't seem to update their firmware as often as they probably should.
There was only one burner which achieved good quality with all tested media (except with a VERY new dvd-rw 4x), and that was the LG GSA-4082B... about as cheap as it gets, and unlike all other tested drives it even reads/writes DVD-RAM, go figure... It's slower than some others at CD burning/reading though.
LiteOn (which had very good CDR burners) pretty much failed the quality test with every media tested and it wasn't the only one
You can see some of these results here:
http://www.cdrlabs.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?p=111964

(btw that LG isn't the newest model - that would be the GSA-4120B. Can do 12x +R, 2.4x +R DL, 5x (instead of 3x) RAM. Haven't seen a review of it though, just because the predecessor achieved good burn quality doesn't necessarily mean this one does too)

 

[Bouncing Zabaglione Bros.]

There was a review of 8x DVD burners recently in c't. In contrast to lots of other reviews, they actually measured burn quality (in audiodev lab), with several media. The results are IMHO horrible, almost all drives failed the quality test with several different media. The key issue here seems to be that the firmware really must know the media manufacturer/type, but since a new generation of drives appear every few weeks the manufacturer don't seem to update their firmware as often as they probably should.

This might be a reason to spend the extra on a Plextor because they do upgrade their firmware quite regularly. If only the PX712 did dual-density, it would have almost everything.

 

[BRiT]

The NEC-2500a is a solid drive. I've burned over 400 DVD-Rs and 50 CD-Rs and haven't had a glitch in any of them. I haven't created a single coaster, every single burn has been solid. I have it mounted in an external firewire enclosure. The firmware is updated frequently (when needed). It's also widely popular in the hacking community -- some have changed writing schemes on it to enable better quality and even faster burning on certain media (enabling 8x mode on some 4x media). The price is right, under $90 at NewEgg.

The bigger-brother drive the ND-2510a offers everything the ND-2500a does (DVD-R/-RW/+R/+RW) and adds in DVD-DL dual-layer DVD+R media support. This enabled ~ 9G burned per disc. And it's only $10 more!

 

[Eronarn]

Don't forget that the 2500A supports dual-layer burning.

 

[Sxotty]

Hey do you dislike lite-on drives? As far as CDR drives went they were great, and my dvd burner the 812s or whatever is pretty nice, I have had no problem, but I haven't used it a huge amount yet.


BTW will there ever be buffer underun protection for DVD burning?

 

[BRiT]

The NEC2500a has buffer-underun protection for DVD burning.

 

[Sxotty]

Brit are you sure?


Is that only for dvd+R? I seem to find info that +R works but -R doesn't or something I am not sure. If you have an idea where to look (PLEASE DONT TYPE GOOGLE ) then let me know. THX[/quote]

 

[BRiT]

I'm fairly certain as Nero and Alcohol 120% have a buffer-underrun setting which I enable. Maybe it's entirely placebo, but after burning more than 400 DVD-R medias without a hitch (half of them at 8x speeds on 4x-rated media) I'd have to say it just works.

I haven't touched DVD+R media since I've had better compatability with the DVD-R media way back when I first had my Pioner 4x burner.

 

[mat]

Don't forget that the 2500A supports dual-layer burning.

no, thats the 2510a

 

[mczak]

Don't forget that the 2500A supports dual-layer burning.

no, thats the 2510a

Well, you can flash the 2500A to support dual-layer inofficially. Seems to work, though it is possible the burn quality is not that good (NEC officially says the burners are not calibrated for that, who knows). I haven't seen any examination of burn quality with that flashed 2500A and dual-layer media, maybe next month when dl media will be available (at sky-high prices!).

mczak

 

[JCLW]

Another Plextor vote from me.

I've got a 708A and I love it. Lots of firmware updates (and RPC1 firmware within days of an RPC2 release).

 

[digitalwanderer]

I picked up a lite-on about a month ago for $80us at a local show and lubs it to death! (Then again, I was upgrading from a 4xCDr... )

 

[Bouncing Zabaglione Bros.]

I would easily go for the Plextor 712 even though it's double the price of the Pioneer or NEC, but it doesn't do dual layer. I've got a Plextor CDR drive here, so I know how good they are, but I don't want to have to upgrade again in six months when dual layer media starts becoming cheaper and more readily available.

 

[Bambers]

I wouldn't. Pioneer, NEC, Lite-on and LG all produce decent drives for much less.


on the c't tests, they seem very artificial to me. sites like cdfreaks and cdrlabs test the PI/PO errors on the discs and using decent media (eg taiyo yuden) there's very few drives out that won't produce less errors than you find on stamped dvd discs and their results usually work out fairly well with how discsplay on fussier readers.


that said, if your reader is of even half good quality then you can normally use even cheap princo media and not have any problems so while all the testing of errors etc may be fun, at the end of the day, if a disc plays, it plays.

 

[Blade]

Big suggestion: Forget price, wait for Dual-Layer support.

 

[BRiT]

Big suggestion: Forget price, wait for Dual-Layer support.

Dual layer support is here now with the NEC 2510a for a mere $90 from NewEgg. No waiting or price concerns involved. 8)

 

[mat]

Well, you can flash the 2500A to support dual-layer inofficially. Seems to work, though it is possible the burn quality is not that good (NEC officially says the burners are not calibrated for that, who knows). I haven't seen any examination of burn quality with that flashed 2500A and dual-layer media, maybe next month when dl media will be available (at sky-high prices!).

mczak

i know, but since my old 1100a which is flashable to a 1300a still doesnt like DVD-Rs, i highly doubt this.