Are burners limited by the "advertised" media spee

[tamgelikah]

Simple, "newbie-ish" type of question. Specifically interested in buying a NEC 3500 but wondering if I have 4x media (TDK or Memorex) will I be burning at 16x or only 4x or somewhere in between. Thanks.

[garryheather]

If you use official firmware, you will burn as fast as NEC think you should write to that media at.

If you use hacked firmware, you can probably go as fast as the recorder's rated speed - but don't expect the resulting disc to be good for anything other than putting your coffee mug on afterwards...

[tamgelikah]

Thanks garryheather ... that's exactly what I needed to know. So realistically and practically speaking, buying a 16x burner today is really more of an investment for tomorrow when faster DVD media becomes cheaper and more readily available. Just like the dual layer option, today dual layer media is relatively expensive and so today at least you're not going to go out and burn 100's of dual layer DVDs.

[Capmaster]

I would stick to the rating on the media or you risk bunging up the dye from overheating it. And stick with mfg. firmware only, IMHO