New burner suggestions please?

[sdsumike619]

I need to buy a new DVD/CD burner. I'd like to order it from NewEgg. Not looking to spend a lot of money but don't want the worst either. Some things I don't like about my current burner:

When I insert a disc, it takes a while to recognize, or spin or whatever it does. Also, in Nero when I burn a disc, when it burns the "lead in" everything on the computer seems to lock up, then after the lead in, I can do other things. I don't know if this has to do with the burner or not but it's annoying.

Sometimes I have to burn one CD after the other, and that time it takes to warm up or recognize the disc really slows me down. I'm not sure if this is characteristic of all drives but hopefully not.

Also, if there's a specific burner that can burn CDs faster than 32x successfully, that would be good. I use high quality CDs as these are sold to customers around the world. I've been burning at 32X on my current Emprex burner I bought at frys a few years ago. So I imagine there has to be something better than that.

I use Nero for burning everything, so a burner that works with Nero without a problem would be essential...

I've heard good things about Pioneer burners - any input is appreciated...

[CrayonEater]

First I would steer clear of Newegg. I've had nothing but problems. Mwave, Tigerdirect, even Meritline can usually beat their price and you'll generally get a better service.

That said, Pioneers are excellent from all I've heard. I have an NEC (ND-3550a) and love the thing. It loads up fast, and I think the Pioneer does too. With either, you will need a hacked firmware if you want to bitset single-layer DVD+Rs. All modern drives bitset DL +Rs so that's not an issue. Lite-Ons will bitset right out of the box, but, judging by the amount of complaints I've seen here and elsewhere (mainly Afterdawn.com) they seem to be riddled with problems. Many of the folks who own them swear by them, but I'm just going by what I see: Lite-Ons are good when they work. LG suck and Samsung's (TSSTCORP) seem to be buggy, at least the drives prior to the new 18x ones.

Benqs other than the 1670 are considered the best but aren't being made anymore; if you can track down a DW1650/1655 or even 1640, you won't regret it. If you locate a 1650, just be sure you are getting the BURNER and not the DVD-ROM reader-only drive. Lots of people get surprised by that little mixup. Plextors are well-liked but are typically twice as expensive as other models and do the same thing.

All seem to work well with Nero (it's best to use 7.0.8.2 or the latest version) and all, AFAIK, do well with CDs, even above 32x.

[oldandinthe way]

I've an LG-GSA-H10N purchased from newegg. Reliable, media tolerant - both for CD and DVD. CDs at 48x. DVD at 16x. Works well with Nero. About $30.00

I have 3 different LG drives, all with the Renassas chipset, all great drives.

[sdsumike619]

steer clear of newegg? They're the best! I've never had a problem with them. In fact, I just recently bought all the parts and assembled a new computer from stuff I bought from them..

What is bitsetting? Do I need that? I've been authoring DVDs for a few years now and have never heard of bitsetting.. ?

So I'll look into LG, NEC and Pioneer.. If BenQ is so good, or "the best", why are they not made anymore?

[oldandinthe way]

LG will give you bitsetting. Bitsetting is used for compatibility with some old DVD players. It works with DVD+R. It lies about the media, telling the player it is a DVD-video not a writeable, this makes lame old players not do some of the tests the standard doesn't call for which have lead to incompatibility. If the drive is bitsetting capable Nero will auto set this.

BenQ was a loser in the DVD business, they sold their optical drive operation to Lite-On. Being a loser does not mean your technology is bad, it means you can't play with the big boys.

LG is a joint venture with Hitachi. NEC is a joint venture with Sony (SONY was rebadging Lite-Ons before this).

If you would like to see what owners of these drives have to say to each other, www.cdfreaks.com has DVDwriter forums for various manufacturers. These forums also deal with firmware updates, hjacks, drive repair and lots of other stuff.

[sdsumike619]

I went to newegg and found this one; what caught my eye is the lower access times:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16827151133

CD-ROM Access Time: 110ms
DVD-ROM Access Time: 130ms

But can someone explain what all this is:
"Data Transfer Rate: PIO Mode 4 (16.6MB/sec) Ultra DMA Mode 2 (33.3MB/sec)"

Would this be a good selection? 248 out of 337 gave it 5 out of 5 eggs

[sdsumike619]

chec this out:
http://www.newegg.com/ProductSort/CustVoteProductWinner.asp

[oldandinthe way]

The problem with rating systems and user reviews is you never really know how the way the raters and reviewers actually use the equipment and whether their patterns of use approximate yours.

I go through much more media than anyone in my circle of friends. My drive can be burning for 8 hours or more. This is rough use. I know that some friend's drives just can't hack such abuse. They begin to have problems after a couple of hours.

I buy media which is on sale at the big box stores. I burn at 16x. I also use the product returns from a big box store because other people openned the spindle but couldn't burn the media.

I don't get coasters. All of my output reads on all of the players I need it to. Would they read on your player - I don't know.


Would they like your mediam I suggest they would but unless I've burned it I wouldn't really know for sure.

Pick any drive on newegg, somebody on this forum will like it and someone else will say its crap. No one will know how it stands up because the availablity of a drive seems to be about 3 months.

Pick one, buy it. Test it. If it works keep it, if it doesn;t return it to newegg so they can have another open box speical.

[sdsumike619]

I think I'm just going to buy both a Pioneer DVR-111D and a Samsung SH-S182M
Both did excellent on Newegg with close to 75% of the reviews as 5 out of 5 and I need two so why not one of each heh

[budz]

CrayonEater has a beef with Newegg just like how I have one with Mwave.com.

I have the retail version of the PIONEER 112D drive and I also have the SAMSUNG 183L which is a SATA drive. Both drives are great so far! I haven't crossflashed the PIONEER 112D yet so bitsetting to dvdrom can be enabled. I have many other drives so it's not a big deal yet to crossflash. If you're looking for a SATA dvd burner the SAMSUNG 183L is worth considering.

[Ron B]

I've got a Pioneer 111D that I bought from newegg. It's a good drive, worth the money. Everyone has their opinions, but I've bought lots of stuff from newegg over the years, they've always done right by me.