Is ANYONE able to burn at 8x speed using 8x media?

[rick6612]

I'm curious if ANYONE with ANY 8x DVD+R burner is actually able to burn a disc at 8x speed when using 8x rated DVD+R media? If so, what burner do you have and what media did you use?

Note that what I really want to know is, can you actually burn a full disc in 7 or 8 minutes? If your burning software says it is burning at 8x speed, but it really takes 15 minutes to burn a DVD then you're not really burning at 8x speed.

I have a Plextor PX-708A which has no problem burning at 8x speed on just about any brand of 4x DVD+R media I've tried. But when I try to use real 8x rated media, it will only burn at 4x speed.

Plextor tech support has been insisting that the two brands of 8x media I've tried (Verbatim/MCC and Memorex/CMC) are of "poor quality" and that's why it will only burn at 4x speed.

I believe there is really a bug in their firmware and it is not properly recognizing the 8x media, but so far they haven't actually come out and admitted it. Instead they just keep telling me to try a different brand of media. Of course, they can't seem to tell me which brand will actually work... they just say "check our web site for a list of compatible media." Well, guess what? Both the Verbatim and Memorex media are listed as being compatible!

Anyway, I'd be interested to hear if anyone else in the world has actually had any success using 8x media.

[enigma47]

Most 8x media is fairly new and unsupported in firmwares. Especially true for NEC and their negligent firmware team. LiteOn has released countless firmwares for each drive, so they're on top of the 8x support thing.

Hacked NEC & Pioneer firmwares have support for the newer media added.

[bdgriff]

I guess I would have to say YES, sorta...My NEC 2500 did not burn my Ritek R03's @ 8X with NEC "official" firmware. But, after using Herries hacked firware, I can burn them, and Memorex +R's at 8X. So, yes...The Riteks write quality is bad compared to Mems...though

[raymond_barnes]

i use Verbatim +8x(94812 white inkjet printables and the branded 94851 media code MCC-003-00),i'm using two LITE-ON 451@851 firmware GSOC and it takes about 09:30 to 09:40 for a complete 4.37gb burn, burning two at a time, once i think it took less using one burner, and all the disc play beautifully.

[rick6612]

i use Verbatim +8x(94812 white inkjet printables and the branded 94851 media code MCC-003-00),i'm using two LITE-ON 451@851 firmware GSOC and it takes about 09:30 to 09:40 for a complete 4.37gb burn, burning two at a time, once i think it took less using one burner, and all the disc play beautifully.

Verbatim 8x DVD+R with code MCC 003 00 is exactly what I have, but my Plextor PX-708A will only burn at 4x speed on this media. Plextor insists the reason for this is because the media is no good. They say I should buy Taiyo Yuden or Ricoh 8x media, but as far as I can tell, neither of these vendors has any 8x media for sale yet. We even went so far as to call Taiyo Yuden and they told us it would be at least another month before they would have 8x DVD+R available.

[handyguy]

"I'm curious if ANYONE with ANY 8x DVD+R burner is actually able to burn a disc at 8x speed when using 8x rated DVD+R media?"

You could also check the dvd media comment section on left column. Also, dvd writers topic gives more media topics on what does 4x or 8x.

[Vanderlow]

New results for "best media" from PC-Magazin (GER) 5/2004.

Someone summarized this German article on this thread for media ..which there is more info there, towards the end of the thread.

http://www.cdrlabs.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=13405&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=25


BEST DVD-R discs
================
Disc trade name (ID) Burns within standards with... / comments

1. Maxell DVD-R 1-4x (TYG01) All except Sony DRU-530 / superior quality / good jitter
2. 3A Media 8x (3A0801) All except LiteOn 811S & Sony DRU-530 / superior quality / ok jitter
3. Traxdata DVD-R (RitekG04) All except LiteOn 811s & Sony DRU-530 / good quality / very good jitter


WORST DVD-R discs
=================
Disc trade name (ID) Burns within standards with... / comments

- Bulkpaq DVD-R 4x (prodiscS03) LG-4801 / horrible jitter
- Sky DVD-R 1x-4x (VDSPMSAB01) Plextor PX-708A / jitter very variable
- DataWrite DVD-R 4X (AN32) LG / NEC / PLextor (barely) / POFs on all drives / jitter variable


BEST DVD+R discs
================
Disc trade name (ID) Burns within standards with... / comments

- 3A Media DVD+R 1-4x (POMSC001) All sans Sony / excellent quality / jitter within specs (sans LG / Sony)
- Fujifilm DVD+R 4x (RicohJPNR01) All sans LiteOn / very good quality / jitter variable
- Platinum DVD+R (Ritek R02) ALL! / excellent quality / jitter mostly within specs (sans LG, LiteOn & Sony)
- Verbatim DVD+R 1-4x (MCC002) All sans LiteOn / superior quality / jitter within specs (sans LiteOn, Pioneer & Sony)


WORST DVD+R discs
=================
Disc trade name (ID) Burns within standards with... / comments

- Verbatim DVD+RAdv.Azo8x(MCC003) BenQ, LG, Nec / good quality / too high jitter on all drives NOTE! This disc was burned at 8X by most drives. Other discs were burned at 2x or 4x
- Philips DVD+R 4X (CMC MAG F01) All sans LiteOn, Pioneer & sony / otherwise very good quality / jitter bit too high
- Mmore DVD+R (MBIPG101R03) All sans LiteOn, Plextor & Sony / otherwise very good quality jitter too high

[enigma47]

What are you talking about? LiteOn drives burn Fuji 4x +R wonderfully!

[Vanderlow]

It's on this thread. These are CATS scan which are much more sophisticated and include jitter measuring and are more accurate then Kprobes. Actually both magazine reviews with CATS show the Lite-on 811 did poor with Rich 4x +. Maybe there are newer firmwares which have improved the 811 performance, but you'd have to access to CATS scan to see if it's real improvement over the less accurate Kprobes.

http://www.cdrlabs.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=13405&start=0

[code65536]

It's on this thread. These are CATS scan which are much more sophisticated and include jitter measuring and are more accurate then Kprobes. Actually both magazine reviews with CATS show the Lite-on 811 did poor with Rich 4x +. Maybe there are newer firmwares which have improved the 811 performance, but you'd have to access to CATS scan to see if it's real improvement over the less accurate Kprobes.

http://www.cdrlabs.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=13405&start=0

I agree. KProbes are very unreliable, but for people like us, it's the best we got. But it does give us a rough idea of the disc's quality, and it's especially helpful if all the scans are done on the same drive, as much of the unreliable variation of KP is associated with scanning in different drives under different FW revisions.

But as I've said in the CDF forum, Ricoh R01 tests are very... curious. For one, R01 media is very unreliable in terms of quality. Someone who has great R01 burns with one batch will get bad burns in another. Another problem is that the old 411/811 drives (which sucked) seemed very variable as well. Some could dance and do wonders while others were spitting out even the good media (could be the mags got a bad 811 drive to play with). The newer drives don't seem to vary NEARLY as much. As I said in another post recently, LiteOn screwed up with the 411/811, but I think that they've recognized that, and their newer drives, although they don't solve all of the problems, do perform considerably better and than the older ones and also with less variation from drive to drive.

I will say one thing for sure... I can personally vouch for the performance of my 451S@851S (note that this isn't a 411/811). I've burned over 50 Fuji R01 discs with wonderful KProbe scans (~1-2 PI avg, < 0.1 PO avg) (and if you don't believe in KProbe, the discs' reading curve looks beautiful in my drive--going all the way to 16x because I booktyped them). I even burned a 2.4x Ricoh R00 at 8x and got the same good results. So, eh, I wish that these people with the CATS scanners would do some scans with the newer LiteOn drives and with better firmwares (I looked over some of their stuff, and the firmware selection they made aren't the best) because I'm really curious to see just how much better this newer generation of LiteOn DVD burners fare against the stricken 401/411/811.