Lite-On's newest firmware for the 166S "DS18"

[defense]

Has anyone who has the Lite-On 166S DVD ROM tried the newest firmware revision? It was introduced on May 5th and being that I am currently ripping in excess of 15x with DVD-5's with a hacked DS14 firmware...I didn't want to upgrade unless someone can confirm the upgrade is worth while.

I know some of my unbranded media take longer to rip...so I wonder if the "matching new media" ability of the latest firmware will rectify some of that. I know that VERBATIM DVD+R's were slower to rip then the DVD-R's before I upgraded to DS14...so if the same is true wtih the newest firmware, i'd probably upgrade again.


Anyone who has upgraded to DS18, please post your info.

If anyone wants to test and report their results..you can download the newest firmware from the Official Lite-On site here:

http://www.jlms.com.tw/download.htm

Thanks

[defense]

I actually decided to flash my drive with the newest firmware and it works great. The rip speeds were NOT decreased as with previous versions and it seems to read some of my non branded media much quicker although I haven't noticed an increase in rip speed in the non branded media..but am still getting up to 15.4x on DVD5's...basically, the newest firmware flash was successful!

[kcalczab]

version 31 is available

anyone installed it??

[defense]

version 31 is available

anyone installed it??

Version 31...you sure you got the right drive? The LIte-On firmware for the 166S is in a DS- # format. Like DS-13, DS-14, DS18..etc. I saw about a month ago or so there was an UN-Official DS19 firmware..but never upgraded it. Where do you see a "VERSION 31" ?


UPDATE: I just checked the OFFICIAL Lite-On firmware site and there is a DS1A....not 31...but that must be what you mean. I'm gonna install it now....i've been perfect with all the upgrades thus far...so i'll stick with continuing to upgrade. Maybe i'll be able to read burned media a little faster...although I can get up to 10x on that now....I guess there really is no reason to update...but what the hell.

Here's the Link for the Update: http://www.jlms.com.tw/download.htm

Update again: I see now where you got the DS31 from. One of the unofficial sites has the newest firmware listed as DS31. Both downloads..from the official and unofficial site is 233 kb's..so the firmare is the same. Here's the link to the unofficial site.

http://digi.rpc1.org/165_166.htm

[kcalczab]

can you tell me what speeds you now get from the update?

mine has gone from x8 (ds14) to a max of x15 (ds31)

is this about right or should i go for official updates?

[defense]

can you tell me what speeds you now get from the update?

mine has gone from x8 (ds14) to a max of x15 (ds31)

is this about right or should i go for official updates?

The firmware update is DS1A not 31. If you look at the drive properties in one of those utilities which show it....even your burn software should like Nero. RecordNow Max lists it as DS1A just like the official site.

That's not a real big deal though...it seems like the unofficial site just made a mistake on the name. It appears that BOTH are the same firmware so I wouldn't worry about updating again. As far as a difference in speeds....I used to get up to 15.4x on DVD-5's with DS18 and i'm getting the same with DS1A. However, even though I could get up to 10x on burned DVDR media....it would take about 80% of the rip to get to those speeds. Still....i'd rip a full burned disk in about 7-8 minutes.

But now i'm seeing that the rip speeds are starting out much, much faster and increasing much, much quicker on burned media. My drive gets to around 8x within the first 5% and stays the same for a while but slowly starts to increase. I still haven't gotten past 10x on burned media yet...but i'm ripping faster overall because the drive rips at faster speeds... quicker.

I'm definitely happy. :P

[kcalczab]

nice

cheers for that, i never thanked you for the help back in march before i changed machines and drive so for that and this many thanks

your drive is reading the same as mine in both media rippin speeds!!

baz

[defense]

nice

cheers for that, i never thanked you for the help back in march before i changed machines and drive so for that and this many thanks

No prob.

your drive is reading the same as mine in both media rippin speeds!!

Cool...yea...I take it for granted how fast I rip. I've gotten a full DVD-5 in around 3 minutes...that's just insane..but it's usually ~4 ...almost never longer then 5....so ripping is as close to instant as we can get. :P