Updated 4x Matrix Media review: Oct. 4th 2003

[Faustus]

Look out below!

Sorry for the small b&w pictures, until I post the review on my website it will have to do.

[Faustus]

Here we go.

Ok so I figured this disc has been covered alot lately, but I'll post up what I found. As usual YMMV, always buy a smaller sample before jumping into huge bulk orders... blah blah blah.

UPDATE: It was suggested that I try the latest version of CD Speed from Nero and I did so. The review itself was done on a friend PC. Since that Time I have put the test disc through my own computer with the latest software and the results are VERY nice. Look at the bottom of the review for the Nero CD-DVD Speed image.

******

I'm actually fairly impressed with the current matrix media, its by no means perfect, but when you consider the price its not really so bad. I'll post up the pictures and let you see for yourself. My webhosting is awful at directlinking pictures so I had to really shrink these things down to
make them fit.

Also as usual the first Nero picture and the Kprobe picture are from the same movie I've used for every disc I've reviewed like this.

First the media code:
00 6C 00 00 01 40 C1 FD 9E D8 52 00 02 F7 0E 0B .L...@....R.....
77 88 70 00 03 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 04 00 00 00 W.P.............
00 00 00 00 05 AA A2 22 22 20 01 00 06 0B 0F 12 ......."" ......

(Notice its the one that defense first ran into, this gibberish code does seem to represent a breaking point in the development of the disc. If you do order that code is what you hope to see)



Notice that the media does not have a steady curve, meaning it never really gets a "High speed" read rate, but also notice that it doesn't really have any bomb outs either. Thats the first time I ran into something like this on a media, while not awsome, its not that bad either as it gets to a rate more then high enough to play the disc well.

When I first ran into this I tried another to make sure... different movie.



Same thing. Interesting... but by no means fatal. Out of the 8 Matrix media I've burned from this current batch (tested every single one) only one burned with the proper curve you would normally see. Like I said, not kickin rad, but not a deal killer either.

Ok now for kprobe.



Not bad at all... over all pretty decent considering where Nero tops out read speed wise.


One more thing... because of a recent discussion about breaking media I gave it a shot, the matrix disc takes quite a bit of pressure to break, but when it does it shatters, quite violently in my case (stupid disc pieces all over the room) After doing so I pulled the reflective layer back from the ink layer and unlike some reported the dye did NOT come off on my fingers. I know that hardly helpful to many but I wanted to mention it.

Basicly what I think is for the price these may be worth a shot, order a 25 pack and see if your interested. Of course I can only speak for THESE Matrix 4x DVD-Rs, not all of them, but over all I'm pretty pleased. I think instead of optos I may use these.

The final test of course is the test of time... but without effective time travel I have no way to help you there.


UPDATE!
Here is the near perfect Nero CD-DVD Speed results I got after upgrading to the latest CD-DVD Speed. Very nice indeed. I think I just found my prefered 4x disc.

[Gees]

I don't even understand any of that, and I'm still impressed, Flaystus. :c)

[ebenton]

I, too received several of these from Shop4tech.com to test. My transfer rate tests (using Nero CD Speed vs. DVD Speed) were similar. No horrendous drop-outs anywhere, but not perfect either.
Some of the disks would only burn at 2X but not 4X. Others burned OK at 4X. In the case of the 2X burns, the test results were usually better than the 4X ones.
All in all, for the price you pay for these, they're pretty good disks. They're not Riteks or Mitsuis or Taiyo Yudens, but they don't cost anywhere near as much, either, and they seem to have a pretty good success rate. Out of about 20 disks, I've only had one coaster.
Since I am writing this from work, I do not have access to any of my CD SPeed results. When I get home, I will try to post a couple of images for comparison with flaystus' graphs.

[defense]

Basically your two results were the same as mine. It's clear as I mentioned early on..that the 3rd formula disks are much better then the first gen disks.

@Flaystus, your Kprobe results look great, but i've never even heard of NERO CD SPEED results like that....to me that's odd. My Nero CD Speed results show in some cases a "slight" drop...but there has always been gradual increase in speed up until the drop point. Your results were more "paralell" so to speak......I think Ebenton had some Nero CD speed results which were more similar to mine. Of course, he has a DRU-510A....as I do. When Disturbed posts his results of the 3rd formula...then I guess we'll see because he has the Pioneer as well as you.

All in all..it's good to see the results are basically the same for all of us with these 3rd gen disks. I have a small amount of Matrix 4x DVD+R's here i'm currently testing...I'll post on the quality of those after I'm through.

[Faustus]

Yeah basicly the end result is instead of continuing to climb.. most go to about 7.8x. It just levels out at around 7x. Not a big loss really. The good part is the results have been STABLE over my burns, which now total 9. The only odd ball disc so far scored BETTER then the rest.

[ebenton]

This graph from CD Speed is pretty typical of the most of the Shop4tech Matrix 4X DVD-R disks that I tested.
Many thanks to defense for helping me figure out what the hell I was doing.
Defense, did you notice that flaystus' tests were with DVD Speed and not CD speed?

Anyway, here's a PNG of a typical test:

[defense]

@ EBENTON...yes, I noticed flaystus is using NERO DVD SPEED....I've seen him post from Nero Cd Speed as well. Flaystus...have you tried Nero Cd Speed with the same disks you've tried Nero DVD Speed? Nero CD Speed seems to be updated more...and being that it handles the reading of DVD just fine..not sure what the purpose of DVD Speed is.

Also, ..my graphs are pretty much typically like yours to ebenton....very slight jags which absolutely won't affect playback. The big ones is where you have to be concerned...and even then....most of the time they'll play with those too....it's just obvious that you want as few as possible.

[DVDEmperor]

But do they LAST? Will they still function in 1 year or degrade like Princos are known to do?

Will they last 100000000 years like Riteks are known to or will they last 1 minute?


WE SHALL SEE!

[overloaded_ide]

Will they last Will they last 100000000 years like Riteks are known to or will they last 1 minute

Hmmm, what exactly do you have on Ritek DVDs that is 100000000 years old

Yes we WERE visited by aliens! The cave drawings are correct!
They live among us NOW. They own Ritek!!

[defense]

ALL THAT 100 YEARS warrany is nothing more then CRAP. And if you read closely damn near every manufacturer claims that "100" year garbage..not just Ritek. Sad how people continue to be misinformed.

And how the hell are disks gonna be guaranteed to last that long anyway...NOONES PROVED IT! I don't care what tests they perform..it will NOT be the same as 100 years of a lifetime. Oh yea..but wait...goody goody ...they warrant the disks..right? HA....what..your 1x and 2x disks are gonna be warranted 10 years down the line when they all degrade....so what...you'll get 3 cents worth of disks as a replacement when Blu-Ray becomes the standard.....and what about your precious Data on your disks? What's that goofy song ...oh yea.... "BUHHH BYE..BYE...BYE."

[DVDEmperor]

Ritek media never dies!

NEVER!

I do wonder though, how long it takes to degrade.... I have seen blank cds burned that have been around 5 years with no problems.


Hmmm.

[overloaded_ide]

Well I figure that's the grand kids problem claiming warrauntee replacements in 100 years! I won't be here then, and I dought my 12 yr old daughter will be either, so let HER kids worry about replacing my disks!

Oh ya that's right, fine print, warauntee to original purchaser, not transferable

I just want the stuff to last a LONG LONG time, and have a reasonable Idea when I need to make NEW copies to fresh media! I mean if I have DVD players in 30 years most of my single movies I'll just leave on DVD-r disks if they still work. But I'll redo the rockey and rambo 1-20 movies to 1 disk, blueray or Xray or whatever we have then.

Course I'll be ticked if the disks die in 1 yr!

[defense]

Ritek media never dies!

NEVER!

I'm sure you want to believe that....keep copying thos e movies...hopefully you don't end up with the same title in your ENTIRE collection "COASTER!" "NEVER" ....how many worlds have you lived in? You better do some research. People have had problems with Ritek as well...and only time will tell. And you seem to think "RITEK" is the only manufacturer with 100 year warranties...MOST manufacturer's offer the Warranty....if you research you'll find that out.

@Ide..as far as the 100 years go....that's exactly my point. First though...you are going on the basis that IF the media does degrade then it will be 100 years when it does. Not necessarily at ALL..many people have had NUMEROUS different media become unreadable....those are facts...and we are talking within MONTHS...not years..and certainly not in a century. Let's see after five years how everyone's media is. I'm hoping it's perfect...but that just isn't realistic. I certainly don't want to lose any more disks to this problem...but it's possible and I'm prepared to deal with it..should it occur to me. Even though I hope it never occurs...like i've said before...I don't live in Fantast land...I face reality.

[Faustus]

No I haven't ran Nero CD Speed on them, but I'll try to remember to give it a shot. Honestly I've pretty much always used DVD Speed for DVDs, but your right the cd speed in Nero 6 is going to be WAY more upto date when my DVD Speed.

Funny, now that I've found a disc that burn at 4x for a decent price 8x -R burning is almost here.... oh well. 4x is more then fast enough for me speed wise.

[Faustus]

Ok I've used my own drive and the latest Nero CD-DVD Speed. You can see the chart at the bottom of the review. wow. Better yes? BTW that was the same exact disc from teh first test. Also I've now burned about 15 of them. The only "Coaster" I had looks like it got a little damage on the top in shipping somehow. All in all every single one I've loaded into the burner has came out great.

[defense]

@flaystus...that's really interesting man..because I had the same damn near "PERFECT" results with about half of the last batch. I just didn't get around to posting the results..but now that I see you did...I definitely agree......what's funny is after my first, almost excellent graph..I had to do a double take...because I said..."NO...this can't be a Matrix disk"...I thought I mistakingly burned a TDK/Memorex +R 4x Ricoh by mistake..because those are the only two disks currently on hand where I get perfect results with Nero CD Speed each and every time. Anyway, even looking at Ebenton's results..those slight drops and peaks are meaningless..they absolutely WILL NOT affect playback on any standalone....but I do have to admit..seeing perfect nero cd speed charts is very encouraging. And even more encouraging is that another formula is right around the corner to make the disks even better.

[overloaded_ide]

What I was saying about the 100 year stuff and waurentees was sarcasim you know that right
I never beleave anything the manufacturors say in regaurds to such things. I mean do I look like the type person that is going to run right out and buy MS windows 2003 the day it is released just because they SAY how stable it is and how good the security is on it??? Ya right, only if I want a good laugh

It would be good if our disks last 20yrs, but I hope 5yrs, and expect less.
That's why I won't be tossing the original stuff any time soon!

[defense]

overloaded_ide said:

What I was saying about the 100 year stuff and waurentees was sarcasim you know that right
I never beleave anything the manufacturors say in regaurds to such things. I mean do I look like the type person that is going to run right out and buy MS windows 2003 the day it is released just because they SAY how stable it is and how good the security is on it??? Ya right, only if I want a good laugh

It would be good if our disks last 20yrs, but I hope 5yrs, and expect less.
That's why I won't be tossing the original stuff any time soon!

Yea...I knew what you were saying about the Warranty.....and the truth is nobody knows. Look at Verbatim..they offer the 100 year warranty and have CMC produce alot of their -R media...many, including myself have had nightmares with those CMC/VERBATIM disks...but the point is...most of those damn things didn't even BURN correctly from the BEGINNING....so if they can't even get their damn disks to burn CORRECTLY from the beginning...to even say they have a 2 year Warranty would be a joke...but 100? lmao...YEAAAAAHHH.....

I mean..more and more people have experienced first hand..degrading media...media which becomes unplayable/unrippable..or both. The question now becomes...WHY does this happen? Many people early on said that disks just don't stop playing for NO REASON....but that's a crock of crap because the first set of long..ten disks I had became unplayable....and I keep my disks in about as perfect a conidition as possible. Believe it or not...after I experienced that...I took DAYS to go one by one through ALL MY BURNED DVD's ...and FORTUNATELY..all my other disks played perfectly. I took random disks of different brands and ripped them..and they all ripped perfectly. I dreaded going through my disks..but I had to. If I saw more symptoms of degrading media...i'd stop backing up dvds immediately. I'm not gonna KNOWINGLY waste time for nothing.

I still remember my first DVD's burned and they were on TDK/MAXELL 2x DVD-R disks...and SONY ACCU disks..and all play perfectly..and it's been about a year...so that's GREAT to see. Those were the first disks I checked and ripped. I think people should randomly go through their collection...about ~25% or so..at the least...and try to rip each of those disks. If they rip....congrats...if they don't...OH BOY.....not good.

[overloaded_ide]

Yep.
I need to test rip some of mine. I had no problems with leda, playing great on everything I tried them on. Now bought a second player (DP312) and hardly any play on it. I think it's the way they were burned, not sure, and don't know how I burned em. But they all play fine still on the DP300.

A good thing to do might be to start using a code for what the media was and how it was authored and burned when doing different things.
led1xSHRkripnero or something like that. SO I can tell in a few months what was done how!

[defense]

Those "ledas" are Princo..right? The reason for some not playing on one of your players is because of the dye color. It's a lighter color on those disks...so your second player probably has trouble playing them or reading them. Try some Ritek's or disks with a darker color dye in your second standalone..they may play fine.

[ampex]

Those "ledas" are Princo..right? The reason for some not playing on one of your players is because of the dye color. It's a lighter color on those disks...so your second player probably has trouble playing them or reading them. Try some Ritek's or disks with a darker color dye in your second standalone..they may play fine.

I think the "leda" he's referring to is LeadData (Media code LEADDATA01), branded as Accu, DupEZ, and a few others.. They won't even burn in my 1300A so I can't personally vouch for the quality, but they're on the inexpensive end of 4x media.