Which DVD Burner would you get?

sthayashi · Post by **sthayashi** » Thu Mar 24, 2005 8:20 pm

Wraith wrote:Am I right to assume that Plextools Professional either comes with the drive or is downloadable for free from their website?

I'm swinging 1 for 2 with PlexTools. It came with one drive I ordered, but not the other. I ended up 'borrowing' the other copy and upgrading as I needed. Frankly, given the cost of their drives and the fact that the program doesn't work with non-plextor drives, I don't see why they simply don't offer to let users dowload it from their site.

dan · Post by **dan** » Thu Mar 24, 2005 10:38 pm

thus far,
plextor is the only company i know of that has a serial ata dvd-rw drive

are the serial ata plextor drives better than atapi?

m0002a · Post by **m0002a** » Fri Mar 25, 2005 12:27 am

The drives aren't better, but they use SATA cabling, which is much better for routing and air flow than flat cable, and a little better than round ATAPI (EIDE) cable.

However, I recently chose the ATAPI Plextor drive because it is easier to boot off that interface than SATA controllers. That may have been a bit a paranoia on my part (I probably would not have had trouble booting off the SATA model on my new machine), but my instincts told me to got with ATAPI since there is no performance difference. Most people on this forum will want to turn down the maximum speed of the drive anyway.

Plextor is offering a $30 rebate until the end of this month for the EIDE (ATAPI) model.

CX23882-19 · Post by **CX23882-19** » Sat Mar 26, 2005 2:08 am

I've only ever gone for LG drives in past 4 years. First one was an LG GCE-8160B 16x CD-RW which was fast and reliable and still working fine today. Next I wanted a DVD-RW so I went for the GSA-4081B which hasn't given any problems at all, and is very quiet. Then I wanted another DVD-RW for my second PC so I got the GSA-4082B. Neither of those matched my new Evercase ECE-4252B (black/silver) but then I spotted the GSA-4163B in Black on special offer, so I went for it. Again, another faultless drive, but I need to do something about my Evercase as it vibrates more than my previous Nexus iStyle which had rubber mounting for optical drives.

rei · Post by **rei** » Sun Mar 27, 2005 11:40 am

Size my also be a consideration in cramped/quiet/HTPC-type cases.

I have no problems with my OEM Pioneer 108, which has a supposedly even quieter retail XL-ish version but it is quite 'full-size'. In my In Win V523 case's top 5.25" bay, it's right up against the PSU which emits quite a bit of hot air within a gap of a centimetre or two.

I picked up a Sony DWD22A, which is an OEM DRU-710A, which is a LiteOn SOHW-1633S made-for-Sony and I have found it is a bit smaller, with more of a "square" shape.

I hear the Plextor drives have these shorter dimensions as well.

Spod · Post by **Spod** » Mon Mar 28, 2005 12:24 am

The Pioneer DVR-109 is a little shorter than the -108.

altoclef · Post by **altoclef** » Mon Mar 28, 2005 7:47 pm

For a few more days, the PX-716A is $46 after rebates plus tax (and shipping if you don't do store pickup) at BestBuy.com. Check it here.

~El~Jefe~ · Post by **~El~Jefe~** » Tue Mar 29, 2005 12:44 am

Slaugh wrote:
Wraith wrote:Am I right to assume that Plextools Professional either comes with the drive or is downloadable for free from their website?
Plextools Professional came with my Plextor... The bundled version was very buggy, so I downloaded the latest version on Plextor's website and installed it... I mainly use Plextools to control the drive speed...

some say this year plextor isnt plextor anymore, its full of problems. If they are wrong, then its the best, as well, it always was.

Post by **Ralf Hutter** » Tue Mar 29, 2005 6:44 am

~El~Jefe~ wrote:
some say this year plextor isnt plextor anymore, its full of problems. If they are wrong, then its the best, as well, it always was.

The very first PX-716 releases (those with TLA prior to 01xx, such as the TLA 00xx series) were problematical, and even Plextor addressed the issue by postponing the European release of the PX-716 until the TLA-0101. The general consensus amongst Plextor literati is that anything after TLA-0104 is good-to-go. Another important thing is to make sure your firmware is flashed to at least rev. 1.04u.

rtype · Post by **rtype** » Tue Aug 16, 2005 6:58 pm

I hope it's ok to reactivate this old thread but my question is along the same lines and wondered if the DVD drive landscape has changed much since?

I have recently had the Pioneer 110, NEC 3540 and LG 4153 recommended to me and they are all similarly featured with similar price tags. Paying a little more is ok, especially if I can add features and/or speed without adding noise (or at least without adding noise at the same write speed and/or while playing back video DVD).

Thanks a lot.

peerke · Post by **peerke** » Tue Aug 16, 2005 9:44 pm

I think it's always good to reactivate an older thread if you want information on the same subject. I have found the situation on dvd-burners has changed a lot since this thread started and I expect it to change in the near future again, especially for Plextor drives.
In another thread I posted this:

As I'm also looking for a new dvd-burner I've done some searching and reading on the subject. My main source of information, apart from the internet, is a german computermagazine called "C'T magazin für computer technik". Over the last 4 years I've found them a reliable, thorough and objective source of information. Here are my findings:
The Pioneer DVR-109 XL is the most quiet of the mainstream drives, only bettered by the Toshiba SD-R5372 (which is not widely available and otherwise doesn't do very well). The Pioneer is equaled noisewise by the BenQ DW1640 in dvd-playing (1,3 Sone/33,2 dB) but not in cd-playing (5,2 Sone vs 7,4 Sone). This because the Pioneer is an older and slower drive.
The BenQ drive does very well in the reading and burning tests thanks to its new Philips PNX7860E chip.
The Plextor PX-740A drive is based on the same chip technology as the BenQ but uses a newer version of it. The result is an even better performance in reading scratched or jittery discs but makes the drive a bit louder (2,5 Sone in reading). Unfortunately Plextor hasn't made it compatible with their Plextool utility because they want to sell it as a budget drive.
The Plextor PX-716A (slot loading or not) is supposed to be the top Plextor drive and is sold with Plextools utility, but it's based on the LC897492FL chip and showes a disappointing performance in reading bad discs. It is screamingly loud (6,9 Sone in reading dvd's) without the help of Plextools but the utility does work wonders.
I'm expecting/hoping that Plextor will build a successor to their 716 model range but for now I think I would choose their 740 model or the BenQ DW 1640. For both the utility "CD-bremse" http://www.cd-bremse.de/ might give relieve in the noise department in the future, but don't count on it.

After this post the thread died. I hope it doesn't this time because it's always good to get some feedback.

Thomas · Post by **Thomas** » Wed Aug 17, 2005 12:28 am

Several people recommend me to get a NEC drive, the ND 3520A. They say it's pretty quiet, but I havent heard it myself. It could be interesting to see a comparision between this NEC, to the Pioneer, BenQ and Plextor, or some kind of relation.

peerke · Post by **peerke** » Wed Aug 17, 2005 10:29 am

The NEC ND-3540A was tested and there is a reason I didn't mention it. It uses the NEC 63641GM chip and the best that can be said is it's as noisy as the Plextor 740(the 3520 is slower so should be more quiet though) and does a reasonable job playing cd's, although a lot of copy-protected cd's are not recognized.
Now for the bad bit: Although most DVD-burners can produce a well burned disc, depending on the used media to burn to, the bad ones are separated from the good ones in the reading performances. The NEC failed miserably in the reading tests. It simply wasn't able to read the scratched or the jittery test-dvd's at all. I would consider the NEC 3540 the worst possible investment and would be surprised (but do not know for sure) if the same isn't true for the older 3520 model.

roo · Post by **roo** » Wed Aug 17, 2005 3:32 pm

I can't recommend plextor as the one I got last xmas gave me plenty of coasters and crc errors. I traded it for a nec3500 and it worked really well.
Plextor is really not what they used to be!
Useful link: http://club.cdfreaks.com

Kheoinn · Post by **Kheoinn** » Wed Aug 17, 2005 7:07 pm

I have a question concerning all of the BenQ drives. While perusing both the BenQ Website and newegg.com, I came across multiple other models besides the suggested DW1640. The DW1625 seems to be slower, yet more expensive on Newegg. Also, the DW1620 seems to be more highly advertised and seems like the flagship judging by BenQ's website, and yet it is also slower than the DW1640. Can anyone give me a list of the differences between these models, and which one is actually the quietest/fastest (e.g. flagship model, probably?) of their drives. I'm looking for a top of the line drive in both performance and silence, but I'm willing to sacrifice a bit of performance to get it quiet. Thanks for any help.

Thomas · Post by **Thomas** » Wed Aug 17, 2005 11:07 pm

Thanks peerke. Since I dont burn a lot, and dont play CD's on my PC, the BenQ seems like the obvious choise

manalainen · Post by **manalainen** » Thu Aug 18, 2005 12:56 am

Well, for a second opinion (and a rather thorough review) on the NEC ND-3540A have a look here: CD Freaks review of ND-3450A.

I have that drive and thusfar have had no problem reading any discs, be it CD´s or DVD´s. Initialization of inserted dics can be a bit slow but I think that has more to do with XP than with the drive and media.

Burning has been excellent so far, no coasters here (Imation 8x and Verbatim 16x DVD-r´s and a slew of other brand CD-r´s).

Ok, focusing on the silent side of things, by default this drive is not quiet. Playing DVD´s it ok´ish, playing audio and media CD´s it´s horribly loud. When burning DVD´s it´s actually pretty quiet, weird.

You can use software to slow it down but I haven´t been bothered enough to do it. I usually rip my audio cd´s the moment I get them (takes a couple of minutes) and play them off my HDD. Easier, faster and hell-of-a-lot more convenient on long term. And being the collector type of person that I am I like to keep my originals as pristine as possible so that is also a bonus.

Thomas · Post by **Thomas** » Thu Aug 18, 2005 2:22 am

manalainen, pretty interesting;

Beeing able to backup copy protected audio CD's, are important to me. According to this test, the NEC is good in this department. But the other test mentioned higher above, claims it's not so good about this. Huh?

Beeing able to backup copy protected audio CD's, is a deal breaker to me. And since I dont burn a lot, it's more important, than noise.

Price wise, the BenQ and NEC are very close.

So at this point, I'm somewhat confused about what to buy

peerke · Post by **peerke** » Thu Aug 18, 2005 4:25 am

I think it's down to your priorities. Since I use a Plextor Premium cd-rewriter for my cd reading and writing and it has no problem with any sort of copy-protection this is not important to me in a dvd-drive. If this is important to you in a dvd-burner, the picture changes somewhat: For the NEC-drive the cd-freaks test shows the same outcome as the C'T test I have mentioned; it has no trouble playing cd's with Cactus Datashield 200 or Key to audioprotection. It will however fail the CDS 100 protection as well as DocData 1 and 2. The Plextor 740 and the BenQ 1640 also have their share of problems with dataprotected cd's so are not recommended for this. Two of the tested drives were not bothered by any form of copy-protection for cd's; the Plextor PX-716A and the LiteOn SOHW-1693S. Of these two the Plextor is by far the most expensive but can be silenced with the Plextool utility and the LiteOn is cheap but very loud (10,3 Sone/ 56,6dB for cd's; 2,8 Sone/40,3 dB for dvd's).
If it were my choice I would choose dedicated drives for cd's and dvd's and wouldn't try to do it all with just one drive. If space or money get priority the choice is much harder.

spiffy102 · Post by **spiffy102** » Thu Aug 18, 2005 4:37 am

To add to Thomas' confusion, and my own, take a look at www.quietpc.com/uk/components.php#dvd

They claim that the NEC ND-3540A is "very quiet during DVD playback, which is where quietness is a must!". Of course they do sell it, but still, their whole reputation is riding on being quiet.

This is the complete opposite of what manalainen has experienced with his/her/it's NEC.

For some reason dvd/cd players/burners can really vary within a model line even. I think you may have to just get lucky with these things.

Sizzle · Post by **Sizzle** » Thu Aug 18, 2005 4:58 am

Pioneer retails with the XL denotation are very quiet. I can hardly hear mine.

olavi · Post by **olavi** » Thu Aug 18, 2005 6:52 am

What about LG vs. BenQ/Plextor 740? Which one is better noise-wise?

peerke · Post by **peerke** » Thu Aug 18, 2005 11:34 am

olavi wrote:What about LG vs. BenQ/Plextor 740? Which one is better noise-wise?

It depends on the model. For the LG GSA-4163B, as tested in c't magazin, the noise measurements are 4,9 Sone/46,3 dB for reading CD-ROM and 2,6 Sone/38,6 dB for Video-DVD playing. See above for BenQ/Plextor.
My own LG GSA-4081B is a slower model and I consider it reasonably quiet for DVD but not very for CD.

peerke · Post by **peerke** » Thu Aug 18, 2005 11:39 am

roo wrote:I can't recommend plextor as the one I got last xmas gave me plenty of coasters and crc errors. I traded it for a nec3500 and it worked really well.
Plextor is really not what they used to be!
Useful link: http://club.cdfreaks.com

Roo, what model Plextor did you have? The first series of the 716 model had big problems but Plextor revised it and gave the option of exchanging the troubled models for a newer version.

nina · Post by **nina** » Thu Aug 18, 2005 1:15 pm

If you don't know this yet..cdrinfo..
a lot of detailed reviews on all optical stuff and others..
Thanks to this site, I bought me a BenQ DW1620Pro,
and I really like it. Silent and great performance, and cheap.
Burns every media you need. I burned already really a lot
of CD's and DVD's, even double sided, the price of the DS media
is still to high, but you have the option to burn.

.http://www.cdrinfo.com/Sections/Reviews ... tegoryId=1

Kheoinn · Post by **Kheoinn** » Thu Aug 18, 2005 1:24 pm

Kheoinn wrote:I have a question concerning all of the BenQ drives. While perusing both the BenQ Website and newegg.com, I came across multiple other models besides the suggested DW1640. The DW1625 seems to be slower, yet more expensive on Newegg. Also, the DW1620 seems to be more highly advertised and seems like the flagship judging by BenQ's website, and yet it is also slower than the DW1640. Can anyone give me a list of the differences between these models, and which one is actually the quietest/fastest (e.g. flagship model, probably?) of their drives. I'm looking for a top of the line drive in both performance and silence, but I'm willing to sacrifice a bit of performance to get it quiet. Thanks for any help.

Just in case nobody noticed it (since nobody answered it yet)

. It was getting kind of far up on the page and people tend to only read the last couple of messages (especially from an older thread). Can anyone help me out here? Thanks.

peerke · Post by **peerke** » Thu Aug 18, 2005 9:37 pm

Kheoinn wrote:
Kheoinn wrote:I have a question concerning all of the BenQ drives. While perusing both the BenQ Website and newegg.com, I came across multiple other models besides the suggested DW1640. The DW1625 seems to be slower, yet more expensive on Newegg. Also, the DW1620 seems to be more highly advertised and seems like the flagship judging by BenQ's website, and yet it is also slower than the DW1640. Can anyone give me a list of the differences between these models, and which one is actually the quietest/fastest (e.g. flagship model, probably?) of their drives. I'm looking for a top of the line drive in both performance and silence, but I'm willing to sacrifice a bit of performance to get it quiet. Thanks for any help.
Just in case nobody noticed it (since nobody answered it yet) . It was getting kind of far up on the page and people tend to only read the last couple of messages (especially from an older thread). Can anyone help me out here? Thanks.

Oops, it slipt my mind to answer your question.
The BenQ 1620 was BenQ's first double layer burner. The 1625 added lightscribe technology which means you can print images on a disc to make it look more attractive/profesional. The 1640 model is their newest drive and their best (except for noiseproduction), but it doesn't support lightscribe. Possibly a future model, 1645, will.

daremo · Post by **daremo** » Wed Sep 07, 2005 6:35 pm

spiffy102 wrote:To add to Thomas' confusion, and my own, take a look at www.quietpc.com/uk/components.php#dvd

They claim that the NEC ND-3540A is "very quiet during DVD playback, which is where quietness is a must!". Of course they do sell it, but still, their whole reputation is riding on being quiet.

This is the complete opposite of what manalainen has experienced with his/her/it's NEC.

For some reason dvd/cd players/burners can really vary within a model line even. I think you may have to just get lucky with these things.

That's for sure. I just RMA'd my NEC 3540 - It vibrated so loudly and violently during several DVD and several CD playbacks that the media was unlistenable - and vibrated the case so much a small screwdriver I had left on top of it rolled off! A f/w upgrade did not help. Maybe another will work. Otherwise I'll look into a BenQ or Pioneer.

manalainen · Post by **manalainen** » Thu Sep 08, 2005 1:32 am

Hi, just an update, I managed to quiet my NEC 3540 down with the help of Nero DriveSpeed software which was mentioned earlier in this thread by meglamaniac. Thanks for reminding me of it, it´s a great piece of software.

Both cd and dvd playback are quiet now, none of that highspeed revving up of cd´s I used to experience with M$ Media Player 10 and dvd playback seems even more quiet.

Because the program limits the rotation speed of the discs seeking and fast forwarding etc. of dvd´s does not cause the drive to rev up. You might lose a little responsiveness but the fact that you don´t have to endure the annoying buzz and the gradual revving down (which seems to take ages) while watching a movie or a concert/live dvd is a great bonus.

The software is free and can be downloaded from www.cdspeed2000.com

Bob_the_lost · Post by **Bob_the_lost** » Thu Sep 08, 2005 1:34 am

I've got a 3540, it's a nice drive but i won't advise it unless you're planning on flashing the firmware. As it is none of the offical firmware will support bitsetting so i had to get a cracked version (incidentally voiding my warranty).

I wanted the BenQ 1640, but i couldn't find any at the time and settled for the 3540, which with it's alterations is more than capable.

Which DVD Burner would you get?

pioneer?