WHOA! Matrix = TAIYO YUDEN???

[DVDeeZ]

Boy this media business is something else. Seems like every week there's another amazement one way or the other. This may be the most amazing of them all though. I received my 100 pack of Matrix disks from shop4tech this morning via ups and when I opened them up I had a very big surprise. The first thing I did was look at the dye as I always do when I buy disks and get them home. The dye looked very deep just like Taiyo Yuden dye but I saw the same thing with the CMC manufactured TDK disks a week ago or so, and I didn't want to jump the gun this time.

I went ahead and put one of these disks in one of my DVD Writers and ran DVDINFOPRO on it and then said HOLY &*#@ The media ID said TYG02. I know this is a Taiyo Yuden media ID and I couldn't believe it. So I continued to run a lot of the remaining disks through DVDINFOPRO and got the same exact info. I thought that shop4tech made a mistake and sent me Taiyo Yudens instead of the Matrix disks but when I looked at the disks I could see in the hub there was the word Matrix inscribed in it as well as 8x. So I quickly sent shop4tech an email asking how this could be and they responded within' an hour and said this is no mistake. Matrix is now OEM'ng media for Taiyo Yuden and this is what I've got!

I was thrilled to say the least but I still was very anxious to burn these and at this very moment i've burned 6 of them and they have all been perfect. Nero CD Speed shows a perfect speed graph all the way through on all of them. I'm gonna be burning more of these throughough the night but i'm super pumped right now because I think this may be the best deal i've ever gotten to date. As long as these perfect results stay the same throughout the rest of these, i'm gonna probably buy another 100 of these as I don't know how long this will last with Taiyo Yuden and I don't want there to be a different media ID a month from now.

The exact media id is:

00000000 00 6C 00 00 01 40 C1 FD 9E D8 52 00 02 87 0D 10 .l...@....R.....00000010 66 78 80 00 03 54 59 47 30 32 00 00 04 00 00 00 fx...TYG02......
00000020 00 47 32 00 05 AA A2 22 22 20 02 00 06 08 0E 11 .G2

Oh, and the only other thing to note is that the top side of these disks is a Matte finish as opposed to silver/shiny. I prefer these as they don't smudge. They look almost identical on the top side to the Ritek Matte disks.

Has anyone else purchased these disks too? If so, are yours Taiyo Yuden too? .69 for 100 pack with free shipping. This really makes up for my recent problems and experiences with some other bad media.

[LanEvo7]

Can you link me to exactly what you ordered?

[DVDeeZ]

sure, this is what I bought. http://www.shop4tech.com/user.htm?go=view_item&id=2526&cata=1&s_cata=88

think I wrote I paid $69 for 100 of these, when it was actually $67. Not a big deal but $2 is $2.

[500AX]

Dvdeez, you beat me this time to post on Matrix 8x. After reading your previous post, I bought some myself for 2nd days delivery, and I thought I was going to be the first one to post this! Well, here is my testing result from Nero scan surface, and also here is a MID information on this Matrix media. Anyone else had bought some of this Matix 8x DVD-R media from www.shop4tech.com, if you do have some, please share your feedback!!!
By the way, I had burn these discs on Pioneer 107 for only 9 min. with the master of 4.35GB

http://www.shop4tech.com/user.htm?go=view_item&id=2526&cata=1&s_cata=88


Region information N/A not a DVD-VIDEO
Media code/Manufacturer ID TYG02
Format Capacity Not Formatted
Free Blocks 411107328
Free Capacity 4.38GB(4.71GB)
Book Type DVD-R
Media Type DVD-R
Media Id Code Speed Unknown
Available Write Descriptor CLV 8.0x 11080KBps
Available Write Descriptor CLV 6.0x 8310KBps
Available Write Descriptor CLV 4.0x 5540KBps
Available Write Descriptor CLV 2.0x 2770KBps
Write Strategy Speed 4.0x 5540KBps
2x Speed OPC beta 08
2x Speed OPC power 0E
2x Write Strategy field 1 11 87 78 80
2x Write Strategy field 2 88 80 00 00 00 00
4x Speed OPC beta 06
4x Speed OPC power 13
4x Write Strategy field 1 0D 10 0E 07
4x Write Strategy field 2 97 07 0D 0B
4x Write Strategy field 3 80 00 00 00
4x Speed OPC beta multi-pulse 06
4x Speed OPC power multi-pulse 18
4x Write Strategy field 4 17 85 78 75
4x Write Strategy field 5 D6 89 A8 92 01 20
4x Write Strategy field 6 10 00 D0 00 00
Data area starting sector 30000h
Linear Density 0.267um/bit
Track Density 0.74um/track
Number of Layers 1

[kcfoulk]

This seems to be similar to the approach taken by Optodisc with their 8X DVD-R discs also using TYG02 MID to improve firmware compatibility with most PC burners:

http://www.cdrlabs.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=16550

What I don't understand is that is it legal for both Optodisc and Matrix to use TYG02 MID at will or do they have to get approval from Taiyo Yuden? At least Matrix didn't try to pass these discs as TY OEM products as shop4tech claimed.

[LanEvo7]

Good thing I didn't jump on these. I remember Piodata doing this before and meritline was advertising them as Taiyo Yuden's. I knew something was up when 8x TY discs were selling for under $1 while 4x discs costs 1.30.

[godbeer]

Good thing I didn't jump on these. I remember Piodata doing this before and meritline was advertising them as Taiyo Yuden's. I knew something was up when 8x TY discs were selling for under $1 while 4x discs costs 1.30.

I was just about push the button and order 100 of these after reading this thread earlier, but then came here to read the thread agian and the last couple of posts made me a little wary. There are a couple of posts that make this sound like it may be a great deal, and a couple of posts that indicate these may not be what they seem.

So, what's the deal with these - good or bad?

Thanks,

Roy

[kcfoulk]

I remember Piodata doing this before and meritline was advertising them as Taiyo Yuden's. I knew something was up when 8x TY discs were selling for under $1 while 4x discs costs 1.30.

Yes, sometimes price is a very good indicator of the underlying product. PioData actually used true TY 8X DVD-R discs earlier this year when Meritline was charging over $3.50 per disc. As soon as Mertitline started selling them for less than $1 per disc, PioData switched to Ritek OEM discs.

No body should believe that he could get 8X TY or TY OEM discs for less than $0.70 per disc, even though these Matrix discs may still have decent quality.

[888888]

This seems to be similar to the approach taken by Optodisc with their 8X DVD-R discs also using TYG02 MID to improve firmware compatibility with most PC burners:

http://www.cdrlabs.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=16550

What I don't understand is that is it legal for both Optodisc and Matrix to use TYG02 MID at will or do they have to get approval from Taiyo Yuden? At least Matrix didn't try to pass these discs as TY OEM products as shop4tech claimed.

A misleading media code is just that. Can Taiyo Yuden take legal action against Optodisc or something? I have used some pretty crappy Optodisc media and I doubt the company could ever match the quality of Taiyo Yuden.

[lordsmurf]

This sounds like fake stuff. You need to call the parent of Taiyo Yuden to get more information. Fuji could probably help out with this, as far as a starting ground for who to call in USA/Canada/Europe, which is where most of us are from.

This is errily similar to Princo using TDK media IDs or the fake MXL/SONY messes I've seen in years past.

In cases of the past, MXL and TDK took legal action.

[888888]

This sounds like fake stuff. You need to call the parent of Taiyo Yuden to get more information. Fuji could probably help out with this, as far as a starting ground for who to call in USA/Canada/Europe, which is where most of us are from.

This is errily similar to Princo using TDK media IDs or the fake MXL/SONY messes I've seen in years past.

In cases of the past, MXL and TDK took legal action.

Shop4Tech (not new to selling fake media) should also get whooped for stating that these discs are Taiyo Yudens.

[DVDeeZ]

@ 888888 what disks have shop4tech sold which have been fakes in the past. Please post some info to back up that claim. I've been reading threads on this forum for years and i've seen several online sites sell fake media but I Don't remember shop4tech being one of them. Meritline was the first site I ever did business with and they screwed up everything from beginning to end. That was a nightmare and they never saw a penny from me again. I recently got shafted with prodiscs from Rima as well did some others, but it appears as though rima is going to take care of that situation so we'll see about that one.

I remember the whole TDK and Maxell thing but this is apparently different. Those disks were completely crappy and most people that used them couldn't get them to burn. I've now burned 11 of these Taiyo Yuden Matrix disks and have had perfect results all the way through. I was skeptikal too though when I saw the media id. I actually thought they made a mistake and sent me Taiyo's until I saw the Matrix etch and emailed shop4tech. I don't think shop4tech would directly lie to me as they know i've been a very good customer of theirs. I have nothing to gain here and if there were any problems with these disks they'd go back no questions asked.

They have been excellent thus far and 5 of the 11 disks have had over 4.3 Gigs burned on them. Two blocks away I have a friend that burns about a quarter of what I do and he actually purchased some Fake Maxells about a year ago. I saw the disks and the dye looked nothing like the authentic Maxell dye i've got on my Maxells. Not to mention he couldn't burn hardly any of them.

In this case, the dye looks identical to the TY dye. It's not like any of the other Matrix disks i've used in the past, and i've used plenty of those as well. You can definitely not compare this situation to the hijacking of Maxell and TDK mids when these disks are burning as perfectly as any Taiyo Yudens i've ever used and the dye looks exactly like TY dye and looks the same as the TDK CMC TTG01 dye which is pretty much identical to TY dye as well. After I burn a total of 25 I'll update this post. I'm sure hoping my results are the same but I have no reason to doubt they won't be.


- I just read the link to cdlabs and thought there was some interesting info there. One poster said this after the Optodisc TY mid.

If it's true then it's just a matter of time before "8x Taiyo Yuden OEM Grade A++ media for $0.50 ea!!!" will show up at certain resellers...

Well, they weren't too far off because according to shop4tech these are definitely OEM TY's, so that would make sense. I'm gonna email shop4tech again with that link too though and see what their response is. But I also found it interesting in that thread that CMC manufactures MCC disks for MCC which I had read before but the point is that people "think" if it says MCC then MCC manfuactured it. Even if it's MCC processes, it wasn't manufactred by them but looks like MCC disks and dye. The same seems true with these TY's. Anyone that has used Matrix disks in the past as well as TY can see what i'm talking about. The older Matrix dye was much lighter in color and looked nothing like TY in any way shape or form, but these disks look just like TY's and you can't get any better then perfect with nerocdspeed and dvdinfopro so how I can tell the difference when there appears to be none other then a fraction of the price of branded TY's.

[888888]

@ 888888 what disks have shop4tech sold which have been fakes in the past. Please post some info to back up that claim. I've been reading threads on this forum for years and i've seen several online sites sell fake media but I Don't remember shop4tech being one of them. Meritline was the first site I ever did business with and they screwed up everything from beginning to end. That was a nightmare and they never saw a penny from me again. I recently got shafted with prodiscs from Rima as well did some others, but it appears as though rima is going to take care of that situation so we'll see about that one.

I remember the whole TDK and Maxell thing but this is apparently different. Those disks were completely crappy and most people that used them couldn't get them to burn. I've now burned 11 of these Taiyo Yuden Matrix disks and have had perfect results all the way through. I was skeptikal too though when I saw the media id. I actually thought they made a mistake and sent me Taiyo's until I saw the Matrix etch and emailed shop4tech. I don't think shop4tech would directly lie to me as they know i've been a very good customer of theirs. I have nothing to gain here and if there were any problems with these disks they'd go back no questions asked.

They have been excellent thus far and 5 of the 11 disks have had over 4.3 Gigs burned on them. Two blocks away I have a friend that burns about a quarter of what I do and he actually purchased some Fake Maxells about a year ago. I saw the disks and the dye looked nothing like the authentic Maxell dye i've got on my Maxells. Not to mention he couldn't burn hardly any of them.

In this case, the dye looks identical to the TY dye. It's not like any of the other Matrix disks i've used in the past, and i've used plenty of those as well. You can definitely not compare this situation to the hijacking of Maxell and TDK mids when these disks are burning as perfectly as any Taiyo Yudens i've ever used and the dye looks exactly like TY dye and looks the same as the TDK CMC TTG01 dye which is pretty much identical to TY dye as well. After I burn a total of 25 I'll update this post. I'm sure hoping my results are the same but I have no reason to doubt they won't be.

This is from lordsmurf's digitalFAQ.com under the section "Where to Buy Good Media" site:

Companies to Avoid
2. Shop4Tech.com ...2x and 4x is often 1x with fake media codes... they engage in shady business practices and have been banned more than once on several video-related user forums online.

For me, the media vendor business is one strike and you are out! There are too many good competitors to give dead beet companies another chance. I have never dealt with them myself because of the terrible reputation they have.

Of course, I wish you the best of luck with your media. It is quite shitty to get coaster media and your good experience with this cheap media, regardless of it is Taiyo Yuden or fake is reason enough to be celebrate.

[DVDeeZ]

@ 888888, now I see where you got the info from so I can understand your concern. Lordsmurf is one of the few that do have an idea on this forum but that nomorecoasters site just isn't completely accurate. There are a few discrepencies with media he claims is "land fill" as well as other things. I remember vaguely some issues with shop4tech being banned but it was because they were advertising on the forum or something like that. It hadf nothing to do with what lordsmurf said about shady business practices. Shit, if they were banned for shady business practices, then everyone working for meritline would be in JAIL!

Lordsmurf also says one strike and your out. Well, that would eliminate meritline for most under that premise and would also eliminate rima for me from the recent prodisc issue. But unlike meritline, I spoke to a guy named Randy from rima who was very reasonable and understanding and who said i'd be taken care of so I'll wait and see if Rima does do the right thing but It looks like they will so they'll get more of my busniness in the future.

If you'd really like I can search about four or so meritline posts which make meritline look like the worst company on this Planet. There must of been 100 people that bashed meritline in a single post a few months back. As far as shop4tech selling 4x media which is really 1x, what media is that? I've definitely never even heard of anything like that or even read it on here, have you?

But the point I was making is i'm the one with the disks and people are making their own conclusions and comparing this to the TDK and Maxell hijacking when it's not even close to that. As I said, those disks didn't even burn properly and the dye was nothing like the authentic TDK or Maxell dyes. There is no comparison there with those past issues and these TY disks. Not to mention that at that time if I remember correctly no online site would admit wrong doing and 'claimed' they purchased the disks and were told they were legit Maxell and TDK disks. They never said they OEM'd them. Shop4tech is saying these are OEM disks point blank and simple. There is no similarity to the TDK and Maxell disks, not even close.

[888888]

@ 888888, now I see where you got the info from so I can understand your concern. Lordsmurf is one of the few that do have an idea on this forum but that nomorecoasters site just isn't completely accurate. There are a few discrepencies with media he claims is "land fill" as well as other things. I remember vaguely some issues with shop4tech being banned but it was because they were advertising on the forum or something like that. It hadf nothing to do with what lordsmurf said about shady business practices. Shit, if they were banned for shady business practices, then everyone working for meritline would be in JAIL!

Lordsmurf also says one strike and your out. Well, that would eliminate meritline for most under that premise and would also eliminate rima for me from the recent prodisc issue. But unlike meritline, I spoke to a guy named Randy from rima who was very reasonable and understanding and who said i'd be taken care of so I'll wait and see if Rima does do the right thing but It looks like they will so they'll get more of my busniness in the future.

If you'd really like I can search about four or so meritline posts which make meritline look like the worst company on this Planet. There must of been 100 people that bashed meritline in a single post a few months back. As far as shop4tech selling 4x media which is really 1x, what media is that? I've definitely never even heard of anything like that or even read it on here, have you?

But the point I was making is i'm the one with the disks and people are making their own conclusions and comparing this to the TDK and Maxell hijacking when it's not even close to that. As I said, those disks didn't even burn properly and the dye was nothing like the authentic TDK or Maxell dyes. There is no comparison there with those past issues and these TY disks. Not to mention that at that time if I remember correctly no online site would admit wrong doing and 'claimed' they purchased the disks and were told they were legit Maxell and TDK disks. They never said they OEM'd them. Shop4tech is saying these are OEM disks point blank and simple. There is no similarity to the TDK and Maxell disks, not even close.

NoMoreCoasters cannot be completely accurate because it is based on one person's (or a small number of persons) experience with media and their vendors. I too was surprised to learn about people's terrible experiences with Meritline. But weren't they considered good on NoMoreCoasters??? Just because lordsmurf had a good experience with them dosn't mean you will. I guess he got a nice customer service rep on the phone who helped him while you got an *******. That said, I am very reluctant to deal with companies listed as ones to avoid because there are so many companies with relatively good records.

Now about the discs. The fact that the dye looks like Taiyo Yuden does not mean much. I have gotten very dark, good looking Memorex CMC media. Since this is a new product from Optodisc, they may have changed the look of their discs. ALSO, you burning 12 discs perfectly may be speaking too soon as you probably realize yourself. Taiyo Yuden has such a good reputation that there should not be ANY coasters in a 50 pack or 100 pack spindle and that is while burned to full capacity as full speed. I have bought Optodisc 4x DVD-R media (ironically by lordsmurf's recommendation). The first ten or so discs were great. I was very happy. And then little problems started to pop up. Discs would verify with NERO but have a defective menu. The very end would be messed up. And I realized that unless I watch the whole damn movie backup, I will not know if it is a coaster or not. Granted the dye looked very thin and often warped. But even when it didn't the disc was sometimes messed up.

That is when I decided to buy Maxell mxlrg02 media. You should not be getting any coasters with this kind of high quality media as long as you burn correctly and your drive does not have issues with the media.

So when you get through the whole spindle and check every minute or piece of data, and find perfection, then you can rest easy and know that you got Taiyo Yuden. For now, it is still very likely that it may just be superior Optodisc media.

[lordsmurf]

Don't let appearance fool. The deep color just means it is (likely) dark AZO or organic or a mixture of a few things. The fake MXL looked like MXL on the dye. Even I was fooled for a few weeks. The first handful were great (until I tested further). Later ones got worse as the days went by. Color additives can also change the dye, as can colored foils, etc. You've bought those pretty CD-R's, right? Same thing. I think most dyes are dark anyway, it's just a few of those like phylocyanine (Princo) that are light.

Places tend to have high QC in the early days while perfecting. They test more of them to ensure some order of quality. Then many of them unleash high-speed assembly, and QC goes straight to hell. I've often attributed that to some of these "well it was great at first" items, whether it be media or anything else.

Optodisc and Ritek media has had out-of-control QC for a while now. They ship stacks of shit along with stacks of perfect media. I had perfect Optodisc 1x media for the entire time the media existed. Others did too. It's 4x media was still decent, but not so hot. Ritek started out as good as CD-R media (barf! ) and moved up to that golden age of RITEKG03. The RITEKG04 have been mediocre (though inkjet RITEKG04 used by myself and BJ_M ... and others I deal with ... has been almost flawless from our use).

Shop4tech ... such a poor company. It's more like 10 strikes and they're out ... and that's just from people I know. They're pushy, they sell lots of trash, not the kind of people I like to deal with. That's such a company of salesmen. I hate salesmen. I like suppliers. They don't bother to sell anything, they just ask what you want, take the order, and you're done. RIMA, thetapecompany and supermediastore are suppliers (as are so many others). They may have sales, but they don't go out of their way to push it in your nose. Meritline goes both ways (their major problem was TOO MUCH business from so much positive word of mouth .. so I don't really think that's a bad thing). I don't particularly like eCost or NewEgg myself, as I'm not fond of discounters (which is what they are).

[DVDeeZ]

@ 888888, I gotta give you credit for not Bsng and laying out the facts as they are. I do agree with alot of what you say. Not even considering the nomorecoasters site, lordsmurf is a knowledgable poster, but yes, like you said, there experiences have been different with certain media and certain business offerings.

Now as far as optodisc goes, there have been quite a few issues i've read with optodiscs and you have to be careful with them. As you said yourself even with their reccomendation you have had issues. And yes, I completely agree, I need to burn many more before I say these are all amazing. The thing is that I pretty much said that when I posted "thus far" and so far in my posts. I've seen the tides turn as well in spindles so i'm still gonna be real cautious.

As far as deep dye goes, I can tell the difference between CMC dye and TY dye any day. There are differences and i've probably burned enough disks to know. I could almost bet that you could lay out twenty different disks of ANY brand in front of me, write side up and i'd probably get them all right as far as manufacturer. If the dye is ambiguous then i'll get it by etchings or coding on the disk. Most opto's have an "OTC" inscribed on them as well as there own unique serial number coding as does Ricoh/Ritek and many others.

But what I was saying is that trying to compare these Matrix TY disks to the hijacked media of the past Maxell and TDK isn't accurate. It just isn't because those disks simply didn't burn. You might as well of been burning the plastic clear disks in the spindle if you got lured into getting those. Those woulda probably burned better. But these disks are clean and they thus far have burned excellent and been read with excellent results. I'm hoping this continues but either way i'll definitely keep this post updated with my findings.

LordSmurf wrote:

The fake MXL looked like MXL on the dye.

Not the ones I saw. They looked nothing like the Maxell dye. First, the dye wasn't even clean, and second it was much lighter in coloration. You may of gotten a different batch but the dye was nothing like Maxells dye and either were the results.

The RITEKG04 have been mediocre (though inkjet RITEKG04 used by myself and BJ_M ... and others I deal with ... has been almost flawless from our use).

There are also a lot of problems with those Ritek IJP disks too. I bet yours have an H-4 or H-5 followed by a list of serial numbers on the center hub. If it says H-1 then they're probably crap, H-2 the same, and H-3 not a whole lot better. Check your IJP's and post the hub code, I bet it starts with H-4 or H-5, maybe even J-4.

[lordsmurf]

Be sure to run these through scandisc surface tests, read rate tests, and then the old-fashioned "watch-it" tests. Like I said, I thought I got a steal on TDK and MXL back when I was less educated on media. I learned the hard way.

The site I own, and tests I take in from myself and the group, are historical data. Nothing more. Even I open up fresh spindles and think "is this still going to be like it was last time?" But like they say, history repeats itself, and that's more than just a saying. I also check it against the larger database here to see if there are any glaring disagreements (none to date). Your results can vary, but you'd probably find the info fairly consistent.

I've had ONE 15-spindle of perfect CMC media. Just one. And then a complete jewel-case 10-pack of bad TYG01. But those are the exception, not the rule.

EDIT:
I had about 2000 of the inkjet for a dupe job I did for a trade show customer. I kept ordering a few hundred at a time over several months. I don't have any of them left. I used 3 of them on myself from the first batch, just checked, those are H4. For some reason, I think latter ones were H3, but it's been too long since I ordered anything RITEK. Some of the people I deal with are still on RITEK stuff, so I'll see what they've got going on. I know NEC and 104 burners are used there, so those may be more friendly to the lower grade if it exists (I know the 104 is).

[DVDeeZ]

Be sure to run these through scandisc surface tests, read rate tests, and then the old-fashioned "watch-it" tests. Like I said, I thought I got a steal on TDK and MXL back when I was less educated on media. I learned the hard way.

Believe it or not, most of my burned disks get run through three different tests. Nero CD SPEED, Kprobe, and DVDINFOPRO. I'm most bias towards Nero Cd Speed because if the speed gradually increases without hitches that means that the data can be read and extracted if necessary. If there are drops, especially valleys then I'll reburn the project.

I've seen exceptions on many disks as well but that doesn't mean that's the rule. Very true indeed. Like I said with your "RITEK" success with IJP. Trust me when I tell you that there are many issues with those as well. I won't give more info then needed because people on this site seem to want to dispute sources or info because it's something they can't find out themselves. Those people are mainly the ones who are most clueless incidentally. I've burned thousands of Ritek disks myself and I can pretty much guarantee the ones you've had success with have an H-4 H-5 or J-4 coding on the hub followed by a set of serial numbers. If you get a chance, look at five or so and post them.

The ones in some other posts who have gotten H-1 Riteks are in for a big surprise sooner or later, but I won't be the one to tell em'.

[DVDeeZ]

yep, figured they were H-4 or 5. I'd doubt at the time you bought them you got any H-3's but you'd be prone too now. Like I said though, the ones who got H1's are gonna be in for a big surprise but I won't comment any further on that.

[LanEvo7]

I recently got shafted with prodiscs from Rima as well did some others, but it appears as though rima is going to take care of that situation so we'll see about that one.

What shaft are you referring to? Not defending them, but I've had quite good experiences with them. I remember ordering 100 BeAlls that received good praise and for some reason they had the end of disc errors. I returned the whole thing to them w/o any issues.

[disturbed1]

Taiyo Yuden is easy to spot. All you need to do is post a scan of the top of the disc.

Taiyo Yuden uses a certain hub construction, and center ring.

Dye color means nothing, esp. with Taiyo Yuden. There are a few other companies have a similar tint.


It is very possible that Matrix, Optodisc and Piodata did contract Taiyo Yuden to make the 8x media for them. With the case of Piodata, make a limited batch (1,000,000 or so), to get the word out and sell few, then switch to a different, lower quality, lower priced OEM (Ritek), but charge the exact same amount for the discs.

Taiyo Yuden 8x media is currently pennies more than the 4x media. So $0.67 each is either dirt cheap, a mistake, or fraud.

[DVDeeZ]

What shaft are you referring to?

In the prodisc post I mentioned that the disks I bought from Rima were pretty much all defective. On all my burners they had issues. After I got them I read posts from several other people who had similar issues with their prodiscs so something definitely changed. Then of course the disk price dropped by about 40% or so like a week after I bought them. That isn't a big deal to me as I only got 100, but i'm wondering "why" the price dropped like that. It doesn't seem to be a coincidence that prodiscs were pretty much only praised for months and then all of a sudden many people had issues with them including myself.

Shaft may not of been the correct term. If rima was aware of this then maybe it was. Again, there were others that had issues all of a sudden too, but this thread is regarding the Matrix TY disks which I don't want to go off topic with too much. I'll burn more of tonight and provide more feedback.

[500AX]

anyone out there had tried these media (Matrix 8x) from www.shop4tech.com? If you do, could you give the feedback over it, so we could let everyone out there know that these products are really working, and it an't like what lordsmurf or others saying "junk" or "whatever" share your information here. Dvdeez had given his positive point, then any one else has feedback over? SHARE IT!! If www.shop4tech.com is really that "suck" like Lordsmurf is saying, then don't you think this company should be out of business already.

[500AX]

dvdeez, what kind of drive do you have there? my buddy, had a LG which burns this 8x media for approx. 9min. somthing, more than my Pioneer drive. Do you know the reason of it? what is the time on your drive? I heard there is something about firmware upgrade? let me know your feedback!

[DVDeeZ]

I have a few different burners and all of my 8X burners have burned these Matrix/Taiyo Yudens incredibley excellent. I have now burned approximately 30 of them, not a single coaster, Nero Cd Speed results on ALL were perfect and DVDINFOPRO shows no errors! I am extremely impressed with these disks and they are much better then those prodiscs. I honestly can't see how these are any different then actual Taiyo Yudens, but i'm still burning them and will see if anything changes, but as of right now it's the best deal i've gotten ever on media. I highly suggest these to anyone as it just doesn't seem like you can go wrong. .67 per disk for these types of results is beyond impressive.

Now as to your question about speed, in my Plextor and my Sony I have burned full disks in approximately 9 minutes and change. My last project was 4.08 GB's a little while ago and it finalized and finished at 8:53. So having these as 8x disks is just icing on the cake.

Has anyone else purchased these? I'm thinking about getting another 100, but I'll burn my next 20 first so I can say i've at least gotten through half of them.

[Joe89]

It is very unlikely that these have been OEM'd by Taiyo Yuden, I spoke to Masatoshi Inui personally who is responsible for sales in Europe and he stated it is very very rare that TY will do OEM, what has probably happened is Matrix have bought from an official TY distributor (quite a lot of them offer silk screen printing for branding purposes).

Also, I think you will find that Optodisk and TY have very very close relations, a number of the official TY distributors are also Optodisc official distributors and out of those most of them ONLY do TY and Optodisk, which leads me to believe that _perhaps_ Optodisk are a TY subsidiary (that is just speculation though I have no evidence to support that and don't have the time to check.

You will see a couple of OEM TY brands out there, but they are rare and limited to major players in the industry, and sorry to say this, but Matrix is nothing like a Major player.

Joe89

[500AX]

I think as long as the proudct works like Taiyo Yuden, smell like Taiyo Yuden, and most important of it is "$67 VS. $100 OR MORE". Unlike Meriltine.com or other site who were selling fake TDK and none of it worked!

[dvdtek]

I recently purchased these so called FAKE TAIYON YUDEN Matrix 8X disk from shop4tech, just for the hell of it to prove dvdeez is full of shit and shut him off from this site. So I called them, and talked to this guy named Bobby to order these disks. This guy told me they will definately burn at 8X or your money back garunteed. I'm like, they better burn at 8X or your shop will get humiliated!! But guess what, I think I owe dvdeez an apology for not trust what he said on this product. Well, I received it yesterday and burn over 25 peices on my NEC 2500, and not even one disk had problem on the master with 4.25GB, and the burning time on it is only 7 min. The disc was dark purple on recording side, and silver matt on top with "matrix 1-8x" in the clear center. I think I will go with this media now, who cares here whether or not this disc is real Taiyon Yuden or fake one. Product works well and only $67 per unit with free shipping, what else do you ask for? 14 min on 4x VS. 7 min on 8x


Sorry Dvdeez.....

[chas0039]

14 min on 4x VS. 7 min on 8x

Maybe I am wrong but I have never seen a direct relationship from 4X to 8X. Someone with more experience please correct me but is the above time correct?