Sony DRU500A 1.0d + RitekG04 - My findings

[w00tski]

Ok after some frustration from finding ritek G04 media burning at only 2x in my sony DRU500A, using 1.0g firmware, i rolled back to the 1.0d firmware. Sure enough the burn began and ended at 4x in 16mins roughly. But subject to the regular test i use to determine whether a burn is decent or not, i found this burn at 4x was sub-par. Below is a picture of my results.


From this I conclude that it is not sony's fault that the burner does not want to write at 4x using later firmware, the burner simply determines that these discs are not good enough to burn at 4x, and that better results would be achieved using 2x. The sort of graph the above disc burnt produced I would not even expect from cheap maxmax and such media. IMO I believe either a proper firmware or the media are not ready, either way the disc althou burnt successfully at 4x, is not what i call a GOOD burn.

I think people have this notion that if the dvd burns ok in the writer, that the media is OK. I wonder though, how many people test their discs thouroughly enough? I also wonder what sort of results the Pioneer A05 achieves with the ritek g04 media. Simply hearing people saying 'it works great' etc doesnt really tell me alot. Maybe DVD players will play the discs back ok, that might be because its only reading the disc back at 1x.

Anyway, this is my finding on the ritek G04 media, either not good enough itself to be declared 4x media, or sony's dont have a firmware that will write to this disc at 4x properly. Or it could just be my reader, though ive never seen results this bad.. In any case, i think ill be sticking with 2x for now, seems far more mature than 4x is for now..

Have yet to try out princo 4x media.

[DurocShark]

What about 2.0e?

[ZippyUK]

I have burnt about 20 Ritek G04 discs with my DRU-500A - firmwares 1.0d - 1.0f. Have not tested v2.0e as I have no G04 discs left.

All detected and burnt at x4.

Unless your burning a DVD-Rom why would you want to examine the disc for errors, if it plays it plays.

All the disks I have burned play back fine in 4 different stand-alone drives.

If there are errors they are all correctable.

My thoughts are the quality control is either poor at Ritek or Sony, resulting in something not working, possibly Ritek is more likely as they are known for their poor quality CD-Rs.

All this said, I'm wary about buying any more Riteks.

[w00tski]

well the problem is that DVDROM's are generally percieved as better readers than the standalone units, problems can also be corrected with some firmware at times. I reckon if a DVDROM has problems reading a disc, a standalone sure as hell would