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  1. I plan to buy a new DVD burner and I am down to the following 2 choices: NEC-3550A and Pioneer 111D. I saw here that there are newer NEC burners but my local stores (Toronto) do not carry them.

    I noticed that Pioneer 111 can write DVD-RAM but not 111D. While I do not really care for DVD-RAM, it strikes me strange that similar products process different capabilities. Why would the manufacturer bothers to make this distinction ?

    I typically use this new drive to make backups of movies. I am leaning towards the Pioneer because it is a newer product and the reviews are so far, very good.
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  2. The Pioneer would be better for writing quality as the NEC's are reported to suck on lots of DVD media according to reports.Check out the CDFreaks NEC forum for all the problems regarding poor writing quality even with good media eg Verbatim.

    Dont forget that LG's and BenQ's also rock.

    The LG's write well to good quality media,I can confirm excellent results with YUDEN000T02/03,TYG02/03 and MCC003/004 (RICOHJPNR03's have come out good) as I have owned a LG GSA-4163B and have upgraded to the 4167B's.The LG GSA-H10A looks worth buying aswell.The LG's wont do quality scans!

    The BenQ 1650/1655's are good aswell and do quality scans,rip very well with EAC (10x rip speed and excellent error correction capabilities) and have good DVD error correction.I just got my BenQ's and have been doing a LOT of testing,I'm so far extremely happy.

    I'm using DL13 firmware for my LG's and BCDB for my BenQ's.
    ~Luke~
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  3. Member zoobie's Avatar
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    NEC has the highest rating here for good reason. You can simply order it from newegg.com for around $50 last I looked. See if they carry the Pioneer, too.
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  4. Originally Posted by zoobie
    NEC has the highest rating here for good reason. You can simply order it from newegg.com for around $50 last I looked. See if they carry the Pioneer, too.
    Just before I get flamed by NEC fans,I actually considered buying one:

    https://forum.videohelp.com/viewtopic.php?p=1536735#1536735

    before being alerted about the reports at the CDFreaks site.

    I've looked at the quality scans posted and know that these are usually very inaccurate.I also checked out the ImgBurn Drives & Media testing forum.

    This is why I come to the conclusion not to get a NEC.
    ~Luke~
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  5. Member zoobie's Avatar
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    Sure...go for it.
    You may not believe me...but I've yet to make a coaster thanks to this site, decent media & NEC.
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  6. Banned
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    Purchase whichever is the cheapest. DVD is already being supplanted by next generation media.
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  7. aBigMeanie aedipuss's Avatar
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    Originally Posted by ROF
    Purchase whichever is the cheapest. DVD is already being supplanted by next generation media.
    yeh right. they can't even get people to start using dual layer media @ $2/each and you think anyone's going to bite on new ray crap @ $20/each with $1000 burners/players?

    dvdr is far from dead.
    --
    "a lot of people are better dead" - prisoner KSC2-303
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  8. DVD Ninja budz's Avatar
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    Get a BENQ 1650 or PIONEER 111D drive. The PIONEER 111D can be crossflashed to a PIONEER 111L drive by using the "THE DANGEROURS BROTHERS" firmwares. You'll be able to have bitsetting to dvd-rom for single layer dvd+r media by using their firmware. Take a look at the PIONEER FORUM at Cdfreaks.com.
    This is the crossflash thread:
    http://club.cdfreaks.com/showthread.php?t=176551

    The BENQ 1650 is also a good drive. You'll be able to use QSUITE 2.1 which is a tool that will remember the write strategy for different brands of dvd media. Check out the BENQ FORUM at Cdfreaks.com.
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  9. Member CrayonEater's Avatar
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    I have the ND-3550a and it's only two faults are that it does not write Ritek G05 and that it does not bitset single-layer DVD+R. It bitsets DVD+R Double Layer to DVD-ROM just fine. The bitsetting problem can be taken care of by using the Liggy's and Dee's firmware. Probably also fixes the G05 issue too. You also need a hacked firmware to do bitsetting on the Pioneer, though, according to the Videohelp DVD Writers database, it works fine with G05.

    The NEC is $30 after rebates at Tigerdirect, and $34 at chiefvalue. However, the 111D is similar in price. According to comments in the database, you have to flash the 111D to the 111 firmware to get DVD-RAM capability, so watch what you're buying if you choose the Pioneer.

    Personally, I think you'd have a hard time going wrong with either one. If you need DVD-RAM, get the Pioneer, else get the NEC. As someone else mentioned, the Benq DW1650 is also a good choice and it's around the same price as the NEC and Pioneer.
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    On 2 ocasions my NEC 3520A would not read a VHS to DVD backup when I tried to use DVDDecrypter iso read and iso write to make another DVD copy, but my Pioneer 107D did it with no problem. On the other hand this NEC produces DVD backups that have better player compatibility than this Pioneer. Pioneer and NEC seem to both have advantages and disadvantages, and I think I might try the BENQ based on reading CDFreaks site.
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  11. I've done thousands of burns on an NEC, out of those I've had 3 bad burns that were because of visible flaws in the media. The burner itself has never done a bad burn.
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  12. The NEC ND-4571A review is up at CDRInfo.After reading that you will now know why I said that the newer NEC models suck.Bad write quality,poor CD error correction ect...ect...

    The older models were better.
    ~Luke~
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  13. By older NEC models, are you referring to NEC-3550A ?
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    I've had no failures to burn on the NEC 3520A. It just fails to read some previously written discs by other burners when attempting to create ISO of said discs, the LiteOn LVW-5005 for one example.

    The budz link indicates Pioneer 111D can be cross flashed to 111L which will enable bit setting. Are there any similar flashes to enable bit setting for older Pioneers and the 107D in particular?
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  15. Originally Posted by mis3
    By older NEC models, are you referring to NEC-3550A ?
    I cant be sure because I dont own one and only go by reading peoples experience of them and reviews.I think I can safely say that the NEC-3550A is better than the newer NEC ND-4571A with the current firmware available.

    I would still recommend you buy the Pioneer.
    ~Luke~
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  16. I went to the store and I noticed that they carried also LG GSA-H10N. So, I now add another drive to the short list.

    Is this LG LG GSA-H10N good compared to the other 2 units?
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  17. DVD Ninja budz's Avatar
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    Originally Posted by mis3
    I went to the store and I noticed that they carried also LG GSA-H10N. So, I now add another drive to the short list.

    Is this LG LG GSA-H10N good compared to the other 2 units?
    Take a look at the LG FORUM site on the review for the LG GSA-H10N.
    http://club.cdfreaks.com/showthread.php?t=178733
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  18. Thanks. I read the review and it looked good.

    Questions:

    1. It was stated that it did not support Bitsetting on DVD+RW media. How about other media: +R, -R, +R DL and -R DL?

    2. It stated alos "The LG GSA-H10A does not offer over speed support with the exception of some DVD+R DL MIDs". Does this mean that I cannot select write speed? I like to backup my movies in slow speed to ensure best quality.
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  19. Member CrayonEater's Avatar
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    You don't need to bitset -R media of any kind.

    I believe that the H10 bitsets SL and DL +R , as most LGs do. It does NOT support bitsetting +RW.

    I believe the "overspeed" thing, based on the article, means that some +R DL media can be written over it's rated speed (e.g. 4x on 2.4x media). Bad, bad idea IMO, since some people here argue that even at-rate-speed writes cause compatibility problems, but since you like to write your media slow then you should not have a problem selecting an at-or-below-rated speed to burn.
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  20. Wait a minute. The review on http://club.cdfreaks.com/showthread.php?t=178733 talked about H10A, not H10N. I double checked and my local store does carry H10N.

    The speed ratings for H10N are slightly higher than H10A and there is no user comments yet.

    Am I taking a chance here?
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  21. Member CrayonEater's Avatar
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    You're always taking a chance with a new drive, new media, etc. Even with the article, there aren't enough different user-experience comments to make a good assessment. You can either be adventurous and give it a try, or you can buy a drive you already know to be of good quality.
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    I found a Pioneer DVR-110D very cheap. I'm not sure to get this drive as It does not support DVD+R bitsetting with the latest firmware.
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  23. Originally Posted by mis3
    Wait a minute. The review on http://club.cdfreaks.com/showthread.php?t=178733 talked about H10A, not H10N. I double checked and my local store does carry H10N.

    The speed ratings for H10N are slightly higher than H10A and there is no user comments yet.

    Am I taking a chance here?
    The H10A and H10N are very similar and are newer variations of the GSA 4167B. That is a very stable design that should be very solid. BUT - as someone else already stated - you always take a chance. Quality control isn't what it used to be with optical drives.
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    Just finished full reading of reviews for Benq 1650 and Pioneer 111D burners, and the Pioneer has 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.
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    still burning on a 4 year old NEC 1100a with around 1800 sucessful burns and still going starting to wonder if it will every acutally die.I will buy another NEC if it ever does
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    The only problem I've had with my NEC 3520A is failure to read DVD video single layer disks on some media when I try to copy a disk via DVDDecrypter iso read/iso write whereas my Pioneer 107D has never failed same task. CDFreaks has the NEC 3540A rated below average for this task in their review of that drive, and I'd not get another NEC for that reason unless NEC improves reading on newer drives.
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