Burning at lower speeds lengthens the life or your burner?

[LittleQueenie]

So what is everyones opinions? Does burning at lower speeds lengthen the overall life of a burner?

[edDV]

I doubt it.

Why would spinning the motor at design limit break the burner?

The usual issue is if the media can respond at full rate.

[Nelson37]

There is debate over what this means for the DVD itself, but as for the burner, never seen any real data.

I guess that a slower burn would mean that the laser is on for a longer time, perhaps using slow burn would actually SHORTEN the lifetime of the burner.

If there was any significant difference, somebody somewhere would have posted some hard data on this. Since there isn't any, I would assume there isn't any significant difference.

[redwudz]

No clue, but it would seem more likely to shorten it as the drive would be running longer and not at it's design speed.

[OneSickPup]

It would seem logical that extended burn time (when burning at slower speeds) would lead to more heat buildup which could lead to a higher probability of drive failure. Honestly I have no idea though.

[jagabo]

Who cares. DVD burners are cheap.

[overloaded_ide]

Who cares. DVD burners are cheap.

I second that!
I bought my kid a 12X burner for Christmas, now I see I can get a much faster burner for less money.
I think I saw 18X and 20X out there even? My 4X NEC with 8X hacked firmware is going strong still so I don't even have a reason to need a 12X which is already getting obsolete if 18x and 20x are already selling for less than I paid for the 4X!

It as been proven!
Exercise 20 minutes a day and you will add years to your life,
BUT you will have spent those years Exercising!

Burn DVDs at a slower speed and you may add a few hours to your burners life,
BUT you will have spent those hours burning at the slower speed!

So if you exercise while burning at slower speeds you have gained twice as much of nothing and so was it a gain at all?
Or was it just another coaster of life due to a divide by zero error? Average it out, 2 gained/ Nothing (0) =Error!

[piano632]

It probably evens out. Higher speeds require higher intensity laser power for a shorter time; slower speeds require less laser power but longer "on" time.

[smitbret]

From what I've read, burning at slower speeds allows the laser to be projected at a lower intensity, contributing to longer laser life. In the eternal scheme of things, though, does it really matter either way when a good burner is only $30 anyway. I am more concerned with the quality of the burn than the life of the burner or the speed of the burn.

[budz]

Who cares. DVD burners are cheap.

which is why I have so many dvd burners!

[EddyH]

Meh.. My first CD burner ran at a max of 6x, and was best at 4x .... (and wasn't even burn-proofed)

it took forever, and a huge number of burnt discs, to wear it out, and i fancy if i was to take it out of the memory pile right now (how could i throw it out?!) it would still make a game attempt at writing a 2x RW

the two moving bits in an optical drive are the spindle motor and the laser transport, neither of which i suspect are going to be all too stressed by the disc spinning at (say) 9000rpm instead of 2400...

however i still choose to run it at a lower speed both for the dvds and cds (typically 6 or 4x, and 24 or 16x). the extra time isn't as much as it might otherwise seem as a lot of the speed benefit comes from running in CAV mode, and certainly doesnt really make a bearing on my life.... but the reduced vibration on the disc, ease of tracking and accuracy of response of the focus servos, the reduced demand on the computer's data system (and cpu!), etc all add up to a psychologically-speaking 'better disc'. no point taking an unneccessary risk just to save 45 seconds that i wouldnt have done anything in... also i've seen the effect regular stopping or even 3 or 4 burnproof stops has on the read quality of a disc, and though it prevents it from failing completely, there is some kind of minor glitching added... i'd rather it just be able to run through smoothly even if there is some system interference.

anyhoo the laser in the dvd writer wont ever see as much stress as that old 6x ricoh did, so i expect to see it still working once it's format is completely obsolete.