Wombler

The latest G05s are inconsistent quality wise and you'll get mixed results. Allied to this there are doubts over the longevity of this dye-type as users have reported discs degrading over a period of time and in some cases becoming unplayable after a year or more. I was a long time Ritek fan with my previous drive and used 100s of G04s. I'd intended on giving the G05s a blast but personally I don't want this sort of potential time bomb hanging over me so I've avoided them. Taiyo Yudens are consistently the best although a bit more expensive than others. If you're looking for a good quality good performing bargain 8x disc for use with this drive I'd recommend Datawrite Grey with the Prodisc F01 dye. These will burn reliably 12x (beyond their recommended speed) so you should have no difficulties with the standard 8x. I see others recommending Verbatims but with this drive I consistently get better scans with the Prodisc dye than on any of my Verbatim burns. BTW If you end up with 16x discs burn them at 12x for maximum quality as there's a glitch with these drives that causes a large PIE spike at 2.2Gb. If you burn at 12x the spike mysteriously disappears. Ideally this will be fixed in a future firmware update although to be honest this drive produces such high quality burns, I'm happy with burning at 8x or 12x for now. I hope this helps. Nemesis

No problem. If you've any further queries feel free to ask. Nemesis

Sooo... I'm wondering if I'm supposed to be trying to set to DVD-ROM, is this for DVD+R, am I wasting my time trying to bitset this burner, or wtf? I tried changing the booktype on the next burn to DVD-ROM, and it said that it was successful, did one more burn, and the same results. With older stand alone DVD players DVD-R is the most compatible and the reasons for this are purely historical. DVD-R got there first and is more likely to be supported in older machines than the newer DVD+R. The majority of recent players support both types and when bitsetting is used the +/- debate is now rendered somewhat academic. Bitsetting is used to fool the DVD player into thinking that the DVD+R is in fact the older DVD-ROM format. For certain players this can improve compatibility and should be in my view the default way to burn +Rs even if you personally have no difficulties yourself. It's best to make your DVDs as compatible as possible as you may have unforseen problems when you change your player at a later date. Bitsetting is not necessary and indeed unsupported on the DVD-R format. In theory it's not possible although it can be accomplished in certain circumstances with the aid of some devious tricks but does not improve compatibility. The Liteon 1653S will support bitsetting via patched firmware if you're interested check out the Omnipatcher thread at CD Freaks. http://club.cdfreaks.com/showthread.php?t=97590 Don't worry it's not as daunting as it first seems. I see you've already crossflashed your drive so you already have all the skills you need. Run the firmware of your choice through Omnipatcher, select the bitsetting options you require, then flash as before. I hope this helps. Nemesis

I have to agree with that. I come across people having problems with media all the time so I explain to them about scanning and point them in the right direction for sites with media scans. More and more people are learning about this and relying on it before buying new media. In fact I actually sought out scans before deciding on buying my current drive having suffered compatibility problems in the past. I used to recommend other sites but quite honestly for the drives tested these forums are now the best and believe me I've searched the Net high and low for such resources. Nemesis

I'm not sure if this is the norm with other drives or just a peculiarity with certain NEC models. I assume it's only been noticed with these drives as a result of the very prominent spike at 2GB. Again I agree that should normally be the case however as a result of an anomaly with these drives most NEC owners in the know that care about quality will burn at 12x and the 12x scans are more representative of the results they are likely to achieve. Not very satisfactory I know but who knows maybe future firmwares will cure this problem and hopefully this is the case. They're exceptionally useful as most sites rely on user submissions and are nowhere near as comprehensive. As I said earlier in the thread it's tremendously useful to have all this info in one source and not have to trawl various websites in an attempt to find details on the media you're interested in. It's a great resource and I can't be complementary enough in this regard. Nemesis

Thanks a million and some interesting results too. The spike at 2GB has disappeared as predicted however the high PIF peaks would give me some cause for concern. I note that they're in different places on the 12x and 10x scans which suggests that this is not just a one off but that this media is maybe not as compatible with these drives as it could be. You've given me the info I was after and saved me some money on discs so thanks again. I don't normally post unless I think I've something worthwhile to say so I'm glad this has generated some interest especially as it was my first post. Nemesis

Blimey that was quick! Thanks for the very quick response. Fair comment and I agree entirely although it's not that it can't burn at 16x but that you get the best results at 12x and 12x is more representative of what the media is truely capable of. I know I'm probably a bit on the conservative side (otherwise known as anally retentive ) but I'd rather have a better quality burn than save the extra few moments. The 4550A is a great burner and can support overspeeding on a reasonably wide range of media with updated firmware using amended write strategies. There are 4x media that can be reliably burnt at 12x with this drive and produce good scans. It's just when you go beyond 12x that this slightly undesirable anomaly appears although to be honest it normally isn't significant enough to affect playback. That's a very generous offer and much appreciated but I don't want to put you to too much trouble as I was just trying to help improve what is already an increasingly comprehensive resource. If it's not too much hassle the only one I'd really like to see at 12x is the Datawrite PRODISCF02. I've had great success with PRODISCF01 (the 8x discs) and was wondering how this drive coped with the 16x F02 which I've discovered I can get for the same price. None of the other sites have scans of these particular discs with this writer. Thanks for all assistance both now and in the past (in the days of your previous no longer mentionable product ) there are very very few developers/programmers that support their product as well as this and it's this sort of service that makes a donation almost compulsory. Keep up the good work and if you can manage the scan I'd be even more impressed than I am already. Nemesis

Thanks to Lightning UK! and all the others for the very useful media scans in the DVD Media forum. I have an NEC 4550A and it's a great drive. Unbelieveably quiet too. One small suggestion though. It is well known among NEC users that burning at 16X with certain drives creates a PIE spike at 2GB. It's unclear at the moment as to exactly why this is however as a result the more expert NEC users recommend always burning all 16X discs at 12X on these drives since this produces much better scans for very little extra time. I know how long it takes to burn/scan discs not mention the cost of the media and very much appreciate the effort spent by the people doing these tests. It's a great resource and it's fantastic to have all this info in one location without having to trawl the Net and other burning sites. But I still can't help feeling that for the 4550A these scans would be even more useful if the burns had been carried out at 12X in a similar fashion to the more specialist NEC forums on other sites. Any thoughts on this Lightning UK!? Anyone else care to comment? Nemesis