What (dual-layer) DVDRW burner to get?

G

Guden Oden

Senior Member
Legend
I was thinking Plextor, but someone in the general forum said it didn't have some function or other that was needed for some other reason or another. :)

I don't know anything about this stuff, I've never owned a burner in my life, hehe.

Anyway, my priorities are should be QUIET (as in able to limit max RPM) and COMPATIBLE (ie support as many formats as possible, preferably including DVDRAM and not burn tons of coasters left and right). Region-free doesn't matter etc because I only have region2 DVDs anyway. :D

Strict performance metrics isn't quite as important because I won't be burning 50 discs/day, though I'd rather go with a faster unit than a slower of course.
 
Guden Oden said:
I'd rather go with a faster unit than a slower of course.
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The burning speed's probably going to be more a factor of the media you buy... well, at least that seems to be the case with the burner and media I bought.
 
Guden Oden said:
I was thinking Plextor, but someone in the general forum said it didn't have some function or other that was needed for some other reason or another. :)
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Since I bought my burner several months ago (single layer, dual layer was not out yet), I haven't been keeping up with specific models.

It may have been me that suggested that you find a burner that allows for "book-type" settings (also referred to as "bit-setting"), because such should offers a wider range of compatibility with set-top DVD players.

I don't know if the current Plextor models allow this or not. They did not when I made my own purchase.

Most new and recent set-top DVD players will play DVD-R / DVD+R discs fine without bit-setting...but some older ones (and some X-Boxs and PS2s) do not. So whether or not bit-setting will be important to you will primarily depend on what set-top DVD players you plan on using to play DVDs.
 
If you are interested in a dual layer recorder, it would be very wise to give it some more time....heck, the media is still not widely available and little is know about it's supposed compatibility. If you absolutely need to get something, I'd recommend the NEC....it's inexpensive - less that $80.00 at Newegg -is Dual layer and has a really great community for firmware upgrades.......
 
Thanks for the input guys.

Is there a speed control program available for the NEC? I hate optical units that run away in the speed department even for tiny disc accesses. Also, does it spin up/down the disc relatively quickly? My current Samsung DVDROM is horrible in this regard.

Wonder if Pioneer still makes slotin units... Those rock. :D
 
What is the big deal about "dual-layer" burners? I had some trouble with my lite-on SOHO-812S after installing a new 200Gb sATA hard-drive last weekend and stumbled upon this site which shows you how to hack it to enable dual-layer support.

My question I guess is WHY do I want dual-layer support? (BTW-I love this DVD burner and it was cheap at $80us a couple of months ago. :) )

EDITED BITS: It also shows you how to overclock your DVD burner, I didn't even know you COULD overclock DVD burners! :LOL:
 
Joe DeFuria said:
It may have been me that suggested that you find a burner that allows for "book-type" settings (also referred to as "bit-setting"), because such should offers a wider range of compatibility with set-top DVD players.
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My lite-on allows for that too with hacking, am I lucky or good? :LOL:
 
digitalwanderer said:
My question I guess is WHY do I want dual-layer support? (BTW-I love this DVD burner and it was cheap at $80us a couple of months ago. :) )
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So that you can burn both layers of a dual layer disc. In theory, you could make 1:1 backups of a commercially pressed DVDs, or you get twice as much data on a DVD. In practice, the media is expensive and hard to come by right now, but it means you won't have to buy another burner in a few months if you decide you want to burn dual layer discs.
 
Bouncing Zabaglione Bros. said:
So that you can burn both layers of a dual layer disc. In theory, you could make 1:1 backups of a commercially pressed DVDs, or you get twice as much data on a DVD. In practice, the media is expensive and hard to come by right now, but it means you won't have to buy another burner in a few months if you decide you want to burn dual layer discs.
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WOO-HOO!!! :D

Thanks BZB, did I mention I'm kind of stupid lucky like this a lot? ;)
 
I didn't know about the lite-on community, but it's good to hear and makes sense. I've always liked lite-on and thought of 'em as making excellent hardware for cheap prices, big thumbs up! :)
 
I have an 8X lite-on DVD burner too. It officially supports bit-setting with a tool downloadable from their site.

That's the primary reason why I bought it over the Plextor. (That, and it was cheaper to boot...)
 
NEC 2500A (with hacked firmware for Dual-layer) or NEC2510 which is Dual-Layer.

The 2510 is only about £10 more expensve than the 2500A, so it may be worth buying the official one anyway, at least you'll get support if things go wrong.
 
What about the LG GSA-4120 or GSA-4082? They are one of the very few burners which write DVD-RAM (afaik the newer gsa-4120 doesn't ship with a driver for that though, so you can't format dvd-ram with udf). The GSA-4120 is pretty fast too (12x) and supports +DL media (some warning though, next years cheaper +DL media will be manufactured "inverse stack", current +DL media is produced with "2P" process, there is every reason to believe that a firmware update (which drive manufacturers might not provide) or even different hardware is needed to write the newer, cheaper media). It also doesn't cost that much (far cheaper than a plextor). Not sure how quiet it is, and it doesn't support bit-setting out of the box (so +DL media is pretty much guaranteed to be unplayable in anything you'd try), but inofficial firmware is available to fix that. c't had a review of it, wasn't too bad though media compatibility was better with the older model (there are 2 new firmware versions available which are supposed to fix that). Here's another review: http://www.cdrlabs.com/reviews/index.php?reviewid=234

mczak
(I'm thinking I'll get that drive myself, but I haven't decided it yet)
 
mczak said:
What about the LG GSA-4120 or GSA-4082?
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Yeah what about them? :D Do either of them support limiting the spindle speed? Do they or do they not support DVDRAM? You say they do, but don't at the same time? :) *confused*

Thanks for any info!

Oh, also, are they available with a black faceplate?
 
Guden Oden said:
mczak said:
What about the LG GSA-4120 or GSA-4082?
Click to expand...

Yeah what about them? :D Do either of them support limiting the spindle speed?
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For DVD-Video/data or CD-ROM reading? Writing speed should be no problem afaik. Don't know if it supports spindle speed setting.
Do they or do they not support DVDRAM? You say they do, but don't at the same time? :) *confused*
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Both support DVD-RAM perfectly well, but they might not include the necessary driver to format DVD-RAM media in UDF format (not really sure, could be country-dependant) - afaik you can still format them with FAT, but typically UDF is used for DVD-RAM (better suited for such media). You should be able to easily download a driver for that from somwhere, or use something like ahead In-CD. For me, that's a non-issue as I plan to use it mostly with linux ;).

Oh, also, are they available with a black faceplate?
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I've seen some 4082B black models advertized, not the 4120B though. Doesn't mean it's not available with a black faceplate, I didn't actively look for it.
 
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