LITE ON SOHW-1633S

cc

im veering towards the Pioneer 108........but i read that ripping speeds
were pretty iffy.....

how long to rip a dvd folks?

KLUNK'

Thanx again everyone

I just replaced my NEC 3500 with a Liteon 1633. The NEC could not burn
CD's greater than 600mb without error, the liteon works fine.

On Tue, 19 Oct 2004 22:52:53 GMT, "KLUNK"



The LiteOn CD burners are great, but while the LiteOn DVD burners are
ok, they're not the best nor the best value anymore.  That said,
there's nothing really wrong with them.  They report errors, so you
can use scanning software to check disc quality.  Other than that,
there are better drives.  Their firmwares seem to be their weak link
at this point.  Last I checked, these were bundled with Nero.

A nice one is the Pioneer 108[there's usually a letter here], which is
a 16x dual layer DVD-/+R burner.  Last I checked, it comes with Nero.
There's also a Pioneer 16x dual layer burner with identical specs with
a different front faceplate.  That's the retail version.  Only the
faceplate is different.  Not sure if this one will work with the
NEC3500AG firmwares.  It uses the same controller chipset, but I don't
know if the rest of the hardware is the same.

The NEC 3500AG is pretty good too.  It's also a 16x dual layer DVD-/+
burner.  Pretty good burn quality out of the box.  Be aware that in
North America, this burner is sold OEM only, or sold as rebadged units
(TDK, IOMagic both use this drive, and the 108 uses the same
controller hardware).  The actual NEC 3500AG drive does not come with
any software either which can be a negative for some people.  It's
biggest advantage is a bit of a weakness.  The main reason why people
choose to go with the NEC drives is the wide range of modded
unofficial firmwares that increase ripping speeds, and burn speeds.
Getting hold of official firmware updates, however, is like pulling
teeth and takes a lot of searching, hunting and threatening even when
an official update HAS been released.  This is the one I have right
now.

LG GSA-4160B is also pretty good.  It's big deal feature (which really
isn't that big a deal right now) is that you can read bare DVD-RAM
discs with it.   Pretty good burn quality across a wide variety of
media, but on really cheap media that it doesn't recognize, it may
limit burn speeds to 1x or 2x.  Was bundled with Nero, but LG tends to
change the bundled software from time to time, so if you need
software, you should check (the disc is taped to the bottom on their
OEM drives).

BenQ DW1620A (Like all the others mentioned above, Dual layer, 16x
-/+R) and whatever the Philips equivalent is.  Like the LiteOn drives,
it will report errors too, so you can use it to check burn quality.
It's been getting some nice reviews, *but* I find myself having some
difficulty recommending it.  This is because of my frustrating
experiences with their 8x DW822A drive.  Tech support is confusing as
nobody in that company seems to know who's responsible for what (at
least at their Canadian branch).

My own experience with the older 822A (an 8x DVD-/+R burner) is that
it has a preference for +R media, and is extremely picky about wh

Whilst acknowleding the comments of others in this thread, I recently
acquired the Lite-on drive updated to the latest firmware release. So far it
has performed as reliably as the CD writer it complements.

--
<>>< ><<> ><<>
 Graham Mayor
<>>< ><<> ><<>

The Pioneer 108 is ??59 ...the LiteOn ...??57 ....bugger........decisions
decisions......

any one else care to throw their verdict in.....

KLUNK'

thanks to all.

I hadnt even thought of the pioneer drive.....

nw im unsure which to get......does the pioneer work ok with cheap blanks
such as Bulkpack DVDs

Thx - KLUNK

For the money, you will be FAR better off with an NEC 3500 or Pioneer 108.
The LiteOn 1633 is mainly no more than a 8x burner, burning faster results
in lots of coasters.