What should I buy LG or Samsung?

[spiderman2k1]

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=7790349&type=product&productCategoryId=c...=1142291022848

http://www.microcenter.com/byos/byos_single_product_results.phtml?product_id=236528

Bestbuy has the LG and Microcenter has the Samsung.

Thanks!!!

[zoobie]

https://www.videohelp.com/dvdwriters.php?&orderby=Rating

[CrayonEater]

I have a slightly older LG (4163B) and the DL laser failed after about a dozen burns, rendering it a single-layer drive. Maybe that was just a lemon, but I'm not too impressed. It does take any kind of media though and I've used a variety and it supports DVD-RAM.

Personally, I'd buy a Benq DW1655. This is the Lightscribe version of the popular DW1650 and it's $40 at chiefvalue.com

[lordsmurf]

Bestbuy has the LG and Microcenter has the Samsung.
Thanks!!!

Personally, I'd get the LG. Some of the LG drives are actually on clearance at Best Buy. I saw a USB2 external drive today for $91, not a bad price.

I have a slightly older LG (4163B) and the DL laser failed after about a dozen burns, rendering it a single-layer drive.

No. DL drives refocus the same laser to penetrate the translucent middle substrate to burn the secondary layer. You more than likely had bad media. Let me guess: RITEK DVD+R DL discs?

[bevills1]

Like CrayonEater I'd choose the Benq. Regardless of choice NewEgg has better price for LG, Samsung and Benq burners.

[CrayonEater]

You more than likely had bad media. Let me guess: RITEK DVD+R DL discs?

Nope. It's purely the fault of the LG drive. I used Verbatim and had six fail on me all for the same reason after my dozen successful burns. then I tried one Fuji (Ritek D01) and that also failed. There's no question it's the drive. BTW my 3550A likes Ritek just fine - I've burned about 20 with no coasters or failure to play in any of my devices.

[MJA]

how about NEC?

NEC ND-4570A 16x DVD Writer $39.59 shipped free - ND-3550A $29.87, Jul 3, 2006
Shop4Tech has the new NEC ND-4570A 16x Dual Layer DVD/DVD RAM Writer Black for $39.59 shipped via coupon code "Techbargains10" Search “ND-4570A” Offer ends 7/7 - Tax in CA.

NEC ND-3550A 16x Dual Layer DVD Writer Black for a low $29.87 shipped via coupon code "Techbargains10" Search “ND-3550A”

[CrayonEater]

The 3550A is good and that price is a steal. It doesn't bitset single-layer DVD+Rs out of the box, though the Liggy's and Dee's firmware will fix that. Also, mine doesn't like Ritek G05 DVD-R media. I don't know if the firmware fixes that.

Some folks say they're having some problems with the newer (>4500 series) NECs. Frankly, I'd get a Benq DW1650 or a Pioneer 111D. If you need DVD-Ram, the Pioneer supports it (According to the Videohelp database, the 111D doesn't actually support DVD-RAM, but every one I've seen for sale does, and I know you can flash the firmware to get RAM support if necessary).

[Marvingj]

LG would be a reasonable choice , Good price, Stability, Good firmware upgrades....

[VideoJockey2002]

I had a LG GSA-4166B LightScribe burner and I returned it to the store because it couldn't burn LightScribe labels reliably. It was sold through a few outlets in the U.S. I bought it at Sam's Club. It would do labels on CD's but not DVD's. Many people had problems with it. It was also re-branded as a HP drive. I forget the model that HP put onto it. I think it was dvd840i. It wasn't sold much in the U.S. under the HP brand name but it was sold in Europe at many outlets under the HP model number. People had the same troubles with the HP branded unit.

I presently have a LG DVD Recorder model LRA-516. You'll find many of my performance reports posted at this site under the DVD Recorders. Just search for that model number. That LRA-516 has severely disappointed me in many ways: (1) It fails to write reliably on any 16X media, (2) LG offers no firmware updates that accomodate new media formulations so it's dead in the water ... if there ever comes a day when I can't buy 8X media from Taiyo Yuden or MAM-A (Mitsui), then that LG DVD Recorder is useless, (3) It has absolutely no way of telling you how much time is remaining on a video disc, (4) On any media besides Taiyo and MAM-A (Mitsui), it burns a disc that can't be read without skipping on other DVD players, (5) The unit responds aggravatingly slowly to every button press of the remote when you are changing channels and when you perform any function whatsoever.

I presently have a LG GSA-4163B burner. At most burn speeds, it burns the first 1/5 of the grooves very lightly compared to the remainder of the disc burn. (Disc burns begin at the small diameter of the dye surface.) This leads to playback failures when I burn PlayStation discs and when I burn DivX files to disc for playback in a standalone DivX player. I don't know if this is a symptom of its burn strategy (CAV vs. PCAV, etc.) or if it's just a flaw of the burner design altogether. I only know that I've never had this problem with LiteON burners and Plextor burners.

So, all in all, I've tried 3 LG products and I've got to say that there have been major disappointments in each one. I thought that a partnership between Hitachi (Japan) and Lucky Goldstar (Korea) {resulting in LG Company} would deliver products that closely resembled the superior performance of former Hitachi products. I was wrong.

All 3 of these LG products have had some things I liked, but any plusses were strongly overshadowed by severe shortcomings that lead me toward total dissatisfaction.

I'm going to veer away from LG products for a few years and see if things improve. Then, I might try them again.

In the meantime, Benq drives are getting some good reviews. (LiteON recently bought Benq so I would expect some melding of product lines that might obscure any distinctive differences between them) and LiteON drives are usually pretty good.

Samsung? Does Samsung make the drive or just put the Samsung brand on someone elses' drive. (Like, these days, you buy a Sony burner and it's usually a re-branded LiteON.)

[lordsmurf]

I hate to toss a monkey-wrench into your anti-LG rant, but some of those "problems" affect all machines.

16x media was rushed. Computer burners need frequent firmware updates to keep up adequately. DVD recorders have never really had this sort of coddling in mind. It's a problem that affects everybody. Your choice of MAM-A media is terrible, FYI, and TY 16x media is not all that hot either when it comes to high compatiblity (a "true" 1x-16x disc). Get yourself some Mitsubishi media for true 1x-16x compatibility.

LightScribe is an HP thing. If you want that, buy yourself a true HP burner.

Your complaints about colors of the "grooves" is the nature of PCAV and ZCLV burning. See more about that in the advanced topics guide at www.nomorecoasters.com

So while you very well may have had a negative experience while you owned an LG, it's not necessarily a flaw or fault of the LG drive. You address issues that can and do affect every drive out there.

[VideoJockey2002]

Your choice of MAM-A media is terrible, FYI, and TY 16x media is not all that hot either when it comes to high compatiblity

MAM-A and Ty work best for me: Everytime, all the time--audio, video, and data. You must avoid the illegal imitations of each. Discs from Taiwan have ATIP's suggesting Ty and MAM-A ... and many purchasers have been duped into cheap illegal knockoffs. Many people don't even know they have the fakes.

Get yourself some Mitsubishi media for true 1x-16x compatibility.

Mitsubishi is sold as the Verbatim brand. Those were the first 16X media I tried and they failed so miserably I returned the entire 100 piece stack to Sam's Club. I burned them in my computer and I burned them in the LG DVD Recorder. Compabitility with other DVD players was awesomely poor. On the other hand, Ty and MAM-A play on everything all the time.

Mitsubishi has also been dumping crap on the market from CMC Magnetics of Taiwan under the Verbatim/Mitsubishi brand.

You buy Mitsubishi these days and you expect to get Japanese crafted AZO dye discs. That which you are likey to get, however, is CMC Magnetics crap with some dye formulation that has been corrupted by engineering geared toward price-cuts rather than reliability and longevity improvements.

LightScribe is an HP thing. If you want that, buy yourself a true HP burner.

HP does not make any drives. They only rebrand drives made by others. Lately, and far too often, it is a drive made by LG.

Your complaints about colors of the "grooves" is the nature of PCAV and ZCLV burning.

Nope. You should be able to slow a drive down to it's lowest speed and get a uniform burn throughout. Not so with this stupid LG drive.

So while you very well may have had a negative experience while you owned an LG, it's not necessarily a flaw or fault of the LG drive. You address issues that can and do affect every drive out there.

I'm not speaking of only one LG product. I'm relating poor performance of 3 recently purchased LG drives/recorders. All in all ... I'd have to tell my best friends there are too many other brand names out there that are more likely to give the best bang for the buck.

[KTH]

Stay away from the NEC ND-4570A. I just got this one about a week ago and this is the worst piece of crap I have ever run into from NEC. The only disc I have that will burn decently on this burner (Coaster maker would be more like it) is the TY G02 and this is using Liggy & Dee's modified firmware. The results were worse using NEC's unmodified firmware. Even Verbatim MCC004 & MCC 03RG20 don't do to well on this burner. I even slowed down the burning speed to 8x and it still produces coasters. Hopefully a future firmware update will fix these problems. I just ordered a Pioneer DVR-111D to replace the NEC.

[lordsmurf]

. and many purchasers have been duped into cheap illegal knockoffs. Many people don't even know they have the fakes.

I'm referring to MAM-A and MAM-E discs, not the fakes. In fact, MAM-A and MAM-E fake media themselves, using all sorts of codes (TDK, TY, etc).

Mitsubishi has also been dumping crap on the market from CMC Magnetics of Taiwan under the Verbatim/Mitsubishi brand.

Nope. Wrong. Verbatim only uses MCC media in the USA and Canada. A few others like TY can be found in Canada. They do not re-brand CMC media, not since 2002 (2x DVD-R).

You buy Mitsubishi these days and you expect to get Japanese crafted AZO dye discs. That which you are likey to get, however, is CMC Magnetics crap with some dye formulation that has been corrupted by engineering geared toward price-cuts rather than reliability and longevity improvements.

None of that is correct. You've misunderstood something somewhere. While Mitsubishi does have outsourcing at CMC, Prodisc and MBI plants, it's still MCC media with their own materials, processes and standards. It is not somebody else's media.

HP does not make any drives. They only rebrand drives made by others. Lately, and far too often, it is a drive made by LG.

That's not the point. HP is the brand to buy for Lightscribe. When it first came out, the drives were made by somebody else specifically to HP standards, in regards to this technology. Not sure if the OEM versions were available.

You should be able to slow a drive down to it's lowest speed and get a uniform burn throughout. Not so with this stupid LG drive.

Then you're talking about something else. Possibly one of the tale-tell signs of a bad disc, where the dye is uneven and otherwise had various problems. For the record, this is one problem with MAM-A media. There is another issue with some media and some ZCLV marks showing up on media, I've seen it on PVC001002 discs in a Pioneer 109, but it's very random and highly uncommon. At any rate, it has no bearing on the actual burn quality of the disc. The "uniform burn" you refer to here is solely cosmetic.

I'm not speaking of only one LG product. I'm relating poor performance of 3 recently purchased LG drives/recorders. All in all ... I'd have to tell my best friends there are too many other brand names out there that are more likely to give the best bang for the buck.

"Bang for the buck" means quality is sacrified for cost savings. I don't think that's what you were going for. Anyway, while I agree LG is not the best, they do make some of the better products out there, in these two categories.

[VideoJockey2002]

To: lordsmurf

Now I remember you. You're the same poster who once said BASF video tapes were best.
I tried to enlighten you to the fact that BASF never made a video tape. They only lent their name to a coating process and slapped their logo on cartons for marketing purposes.

I'm not going to argue with you any more. You're living in some sort of imaginary smurfdom. But, that's okay. I need people like you to buy the crap from competitors. It keeps the price down on the good stuff for me.

[lordsmurf]

I've never said BASF tapes were the best. I would refer you to TDK or JVC tapes. BASF did make/brand excellent tapes in the 1980s. In fact, they were one of the only choices. The BASF motto is simple: "We don’t make a lot of the products you buy. We make a lot of the products you buy better." In other words, they were involved in the process in some way, beyond just putting a pretty sticker on it like Memorex and Imation would do.

At the end of the day, your information on Mitsubishi is wrong, your idea that MAM-A makes good media is wonky, and your bias against LG is easily dismissed because you have other factors that gave you those negative experiences.

[laspis59]

LG or Samsung?

I own some LG 4163 and 4167B's and have never had a problem with them.They are excellent writers providing you use good media.

My LG's like this media the most:

DVD+R:Verbatim MCC003/004 and TY's YUDEN000T02/T03 (They like YUDEN000T02 better!)

DVD-R:TYG02/03 (TYG02 preferred!)

[bevills1]

Upon full reading of reviews for Benq 1650 and Pioneer 111D burners at CDFreaks I would revise my choice to the Pioneer which has the advantage IMO, especially for DVD -R writing quality. Even for DVD +R writing test results shows the Pioneer produces very good to excellent quality compared to Benq's good to very good quality. The Pioneer also support -RAM which isn't really important to me but may be useful for some. The Pioneer can also be flashed to 111L to enable bit setting via the Dangerous Brothers firmware. I'd just about decided to go Benq myself until I read reviews in total. The only little complaint I might have about the Pioneer is that review points out it burns many 16X media only at 12X, but that's no problem for me. Bottom line is quality of burned media which is why most choose or don't choose a burner in the first place. One thing I noted for both Benq and Pioneer was some player incompatibility for DL -R media, and one would be wise to choose DL +R media regardless of burner choice IMO.