NEC 3520A Which drive to replace with it?

[IPOLY]

Hi,

I coughed up the bux! Bought a drive. NEC 3520A, due to all the good reports. Thanks to this place I had possibly made a great choice. Here is my question. It seems it's simple, but then, you never know...

What I got - is a CD burner which has been great. Nero loves it and so on. The second one is a DVD reader. Nothing special about it.

So - If I were to author DVD discs from my own rips, or I wish to simply backup my DVD collection and put the originals in the vault, which way do I go? Replace the reliable CD burner, or the DVD player drive?

I'm thinking, I won't need a CD burner, since this drive will do that as well. MP# and CD Wavs and so on as well as DVD.

I am reading that it is easier to make a DVD copy if you have a drive that has a DVD player, and the other the new Writer so no disc swapping.

So I'll replace the CD writer, leaving the DVD player in place. Am I making sense to myself? To anyone else?

Please set me straight on this. Drive is in Da Plane coming this way


Second part of the question - I'm certainly Flashing this drive with new Firmware from NEC. Why exactly am I doing this? And what is "Bitsetting" in English and how and why I should be doing that one?

Sorry for the Noob factor built into the post. I did a lot of reading but it still is not 100% clear.

Thanks for your time!

[gshelley61]

I have two DVD burners. They're so inexpensive these days, it just makes sense. Buy another 3520, or maybe a different one like the Pioneer 109. Until then, leave the DVD-ROM in place. Unless you burn lots of CD's and that CD burner is unusually fast or something.

Flashing the 3520 with NEC's latest firmware will likely allow more media compatibility (that's usually what most updates are for). In other words, it will handle burning more brands and types of discs.

[disturbed1]

Replace the CD Writer, keep the DVD ROM for reading back your DVDs and CDs. This will keep un needed wear off the NEC. Not that reading with the NEC will hurt, it will lessen its life span. Instead of 2-3 years of use, you may only get 1-2 years of abuse

Bitsetting allows DVD+R, RW and Double Layer media to have a higher compatibility ratio by changing the DISC to be read back as a DVD-ROM rather than a DVD+R disc. Some players, set top DVD Players and PC DVD-ROMs, either do not support DVD+R, or will not understand what a DVD+R disc is, and will fail to play it. Since they know what a DVD-ROM disc is, and with bitsetting, that's how the disc is identified, you'll have a much higher chance of the disc actually playing.

This is mostly needed for older playback drives, 1 year or older. Most newer devices have had updates to deal with recordable media. DVD-R, in most cases does not need bit setting, as the DVD-R book type is slightly more compatible than DVD+R with older machines.

Read what the new firmware offers. Usually new firmware will add either new media support, better writing support, or improved features, or all of the above. If the drive is working fine, and there aren't any improvements that benefit your use, no reason to fix what isn't broke.

[IPOLY]

Excellent help, thank you.

I'm looking forward to installing it. And I will not mess with it unless I run into incompatability issues. Now I'll go in search of blanks. And a good price on them.

Thanks a lot for the replies!