Who makes the best DVD writer?
 

Hi,

I'm building a new system and I have all the components chosen except a DVD
writer. The retailer who is building my system wants to install an LG
GSA-4120B. This is a Dual Layer DVD writer at 12x. I found a reviews of the
product he

http://www.cdrinfo.com/Sections/Revi...=9931&PageId=0
and
http://www.anandtech.com/storage/sho...spx?i=2086&p=1

CDRinfo gave the driver an "Editor Choice" award but I was concerned by
they're statements found in the article's conclusion:

###START CDRINFO REVIEW QUOTE###

"Users may have expected superb performance with the announced 5X Zone-CLV
speed, however in truth, the actual performance is slightly slower than a
2.4X DVD+RW recorder."

"The supported media list for the drive is rather strict, meaning most of
your media will be written either at 8X or even 4X. LG doesn't support the
so called "overspeed" (burning media at higher recording speeds than the
media's rated speed), which may annoy most of the users. However, we have to
note that with specific media, the PI/PIF error rates are simply
outstanding!"

"Going back to the drive's weaknesses, there is no official support for the
Booktype setting (a crucial feature for DVD+R DL to maintain compatibility
with DVD players), CD Error correction could be better, it cannot backup the
latest SD 2.9+ versions, writing performance needs improvement for specific
CD/DVD media and finally, it cannot be used to measure -scan- CD or DVD
media, a feature that the competition (LiteON/Plextor) includes."

###END CDRINFO REVIEW QUOTE###

###START ANANDTECH REVIEW QUOTE###

By checking multiple types of media, and not just high end media, we found
some fairly unsettling characteristics of the LG GSA-4120B. In particular,
the lower quality DVDRs produced particularly poor burns, some of which
where unreadable in other burners. We were also slightly troubled by the
unusually high CPU usages while reading discs. Even with a 2.4GHz Pentium 4,
our test bed struggled to keep up at 8X while reading DVDRs.

###END ANANDTECH REVIEW QUOTE###

Ok, that says a bunch of technical jargen that I don't understand. All I
want is a good and reliable DVD writer that when I burn my movies or other
media, it can be played in my brand new Sony console DVD player. I don't
want to have to worry about the media I buy for compatibility in both DVD
and CD writing.

Please if anyone has had good experiences with this drive or otherwise, I
would very much like to hear about them. Please suggest other quality drives
if this drive could become a lemon. I am forcasting many of you will suggest
me to buy a Plextor, but they are very expensive. I have exhausted much of
my finances buying high quality RAM and CPU for my new system. I would also
like to note that this Dual Layer isn't all that important to me. 99% of the
time I will be burning regular music and data CD's, and from time to time
will burn a standard DVD-R or DVD-RW disc.

Thank you for your time and opinions.

P.S. Can you also help me understand what DVD-RAM is? What is it used for?

Robert

On Sat, 21 Aug 2004 11:51:53 GMT, "Robert TV"
wrote:


Ok, that says a bunch of technical jargen that I don't understand. All I
want is a good and reliable DVD writer that when I burn my movies or other
media, it can be played in my brand new Sony console DVD player. I don't
want to have to worry about the media I buy for compatibility in both DVD
and CD writing.

Please if anyone has had good experiences with this drive or otherwise, I
would very much like to hear about them. Please suggest other quality drives
if this drive could become a lemon. I am forcasting many of you will suggest
me to buy a Plextor, but they are very expensive. I have exhausted much of
my finances buying high quality RAM and CPU for my new system. I would also
like to note that this Dual Layer isn't all that important to me. 99% of the
time I will be burning regular music and data CD's, and from time to time
will burn a standard DVD-R or DVD-RW disc.

P.S. Can you also help me understand what DVD-RAM is? What is it used for?

To back up data. Frankly I dont know anyone who uses it but some want
to back up data on dvd ram and they say its more dependable.

Everyone I know just gets the DVD writer/CD burner and could care less
about dvd ram.

NECs are very popular and cheap. The 2500 was a big favorite because
it was cheap and one of the top writers. If you read the CDR info
tests they always seem to paint a mixed bag --- the NEC was noted for
mediocre reading but very very good writing quality.

They came out with the 2510a which could do the dual layer writing
feature which once again no I know is using cause you cant get that
media here and its too expensive anyway. And you can easily shrink
things down to one regular writable dvd disk.

They just came out with a 16x
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduc...152-031&depa=0

Havent read much on the new one but if they kept it close to the 8x it
should be good.

The reading deal - Ive used it on lots DVDs and havent had any
problems on them , even some pretty messed up ones though I cleaned
them first. Not that I doubt their tests of course. And media
compatiblity is much better than it was a little while ago. Thats how
CDRs were -- in he early days people were really concerned about
compatiblity but as time went on the general compatiblity of disks
wasnt so crucial anymore though its still a factor it wasnt
horrendously bad like in the early days. DVDs -- I can pretty much
burn most media with my 2510a NEC nowadays though frankly if you grab
ANYTHING on sale and stuff it in any burner youll probably have SOME
problems sooner or later. But frankly nowadays -- I dont have really
bad media problems and the burns play on 5 of the dvds I have access
to of various eras ---- with no problems.

That doesnt mean you wont of course. If you have an older DVD player
or buy some really crappy media or weird media you could get problems
or you might just have bad luck and be one of the few that has a
problem even with a new one. I frankly havent had any problems lately.
The NEC also has a lot of hacked firmware that supposedly improves
compatilbity. Obviously newer/faster media - if you do 8x burns , the
odds are they are going to possibly have more issues than 2x and 4x
which has been around longer.

The Liteons are also very popular as are the Pioneers.

They all seem to have problems backing up the latest games etc

Some of the best information you can get will be found on this web site for
learning about DVD writers.

http://www.videohelp.com/



--
Jan Alter

or

" wrote in message
...
On Sat, 21 Aug 2004 11:51:53 GMT, "Robert TV"
wrote:


Ok, that says a bunch of technical jargen that I don't understand. All I
want is a good and reliable DVD writer that when I burn my movies or
other
media, it can be played in my brand new Sony console DVD player. I don't
want to have to worry about the media I buy for compatibility in both DVD
and CD writing.

Please if anyone has had good experiences with this drive or otherwise, I
would very much like to hear about them. Please suggest other quality
drives
if this drive could become a lemon. I am forcasting many of you will
suggest
me to buy a Plextor, but they are very expensive. I have exhausted much
of
my finances buying high quality RAM and CPU for my new system. I would
also
like to note that this Dual Layer isn't all that important to me. 99% of
the
time I will be burning regular music and data CD's, and from time to time
will burn a standard DVD-R or DVD-RW disc.

P.S. Can you also help me understand what DVD-RAM is? What is it used
for?

To back up data. Frankly I dont know anyone who uses it but some want
to back up data on dvd ram and they say its more dependable.

Everyone I know just gets the DVD writer/CD burner and could care less
about dvd ram.

NECs are very popular and cheap. The 2500 was a big favorite because
it was cheap and one of the top writers. If you read the CDR info
tests they always seem to paint a mixed bag --- the NEC was noted for
mediocre reading but very very good writing quality.

They came out with the 2510a which could do the dual layer writing
feature which once again no I know is using cause you cant get that
media here and its too expensive anyway. And you can easily shrink
things down to one regular writable dvd disk.

They just came out with a 16x

http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduc...152-031&depa=0

Havent read much on the new one but if they kept it close to the 8x it
should be good.

The reading deal - Ive used it on lots DVDs and havent had any
problems on them , even some pretty messed up ones though I cleaned
them first. Not that I doubt their tests of course. And media
compatiblity is much better than it was a little while ago. Thats how
CDRs were -- in he early days people were really concerned about
compatiblity but as time went on the general compatiblity of disks
wasnt so crucial anymore though its still a factor it wasnt
horrendously bad like in the early days. DVDs -- I can pretty much
burn most media with my 2510a NEC nowadays though frankly if you grab
ANYTHING on sale and stuff it in any burner youll probably have SOME
problems sooner or later. But frankly nowadays -- I dont have really
bad media problems and the burns play on 5 of the dvds I have access
to of various eras ---- with no problems.

That doesnt mean you wont of course. If you have an older DVD player
or buy some really crappy media or weird media you could get problems
or you might just have bad luck and be one of the few that has a
problem even with a new one. I frankly havent had any problems lately.
The NEC also has a lot of hacked firmware that supposedly improves
compatilbity. Obviously newer/faster media - if you do 8x burns , the
odds are they are going to possibly have more issues than 2x and 4x
which has been around longer.

The Liteons are also very popular as are the Pioneers.

They all seem to have problems backing up the latest games etc