DVR-A03 only single speed

[McChicken]

I just bought my Pioneer DVR-A03.
I connected it to the computer and everything worked out fine.
Now I started to build my project with Instant-CD and put 4.3gb on a disc.
I started writing at 2 speed. It took about 50 minutes. My calculations tell me that is only 1 speed. The counter told me the write would take 30 minutes but every 2 minutes the counter decreased by 1 minute.

Did anybody else encounter this problem?
I tried it under Windows XP and Windows ME.
I use a pentium 3 700 with a 7200rpm harddisk.

[Lamont Cranston]

I don't have a Pioneer-A03 (until next week) but from what I have read it only burns at 2x on DVDRs it recognizes as certified by Pioneer. All others it burns at 1x.

[Jason A]

Wrong "Shadow" man...

My A03 has no problem burning at 2x on other generic media.

Now are you sure you were not on RW media or had it set to "write-verify"?

In this mode...it will write, then verify, but show the two as a single progress bar.

Mine seems to work fine.

Jason

[zed]

I agree with Jason

Zed

[Lamont Cranston]

I am glad I was wrong about the 2x on Pioneer Certified DVDrs.

It looks like the best the A03 can do is a 1X effective burn unless the following from ZDNet Review is also wrong:

"For propeller heads more interested in the drive's performance over its ability to burn DVD movies, we hate to tell you that you're not getting a speed demon here. It shouldn't surprise you that software and firmware immaturity yielded modest results. Currently, the fastest 2x burns still require a complete "test burn" first (just like the early days of CD-R), resulting in effective 1x speeds."

True or false Jason, zed?


<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Lamont Cranston on 2001-12-20 19:14:06 ]</font>

[daren b]

no you are wrong only a few types of media will burn at 2x at the moment only pioneer / matsui / verbatums / apple will burn at 2x if you contact pioneer you will find this true i now from expirience testing media compatability in ao3 for manufactuers you need a firmware u/g from pioneer which is only available at a cost from pioneer to manufactuers only !!!
if you have a ao3 that burns all media at 2x the firmware is worth a fortune to some peaple who are working a crack for this at moment
also you do not need a test burn to write to 2x you can just burn straight to disc 30 mins max at 2x

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: daren b on 2001-12-20 20:09:27 ]</font>

[McChicken]

I did not try to write on the original disc supplied with the burner, only a test burn on these.
And they also seemed to go slow.

But now I will first try a real burn.
I will post the results later.

[Paule]

Did you guys read the manual? DVD-rw 1x, DVD-r 2x. Doesn't matter what brand of media.

[McChicken]

That will teach me, never to believe what is written in the manual.

[daren b]

paule sorry mate ao3 does not burn to unauthorised media at 2x and yes we are talking dvd-r not dvd-rw give me some credit of inteligence after all ive been in possesion of my ao3 since june so i think after about 300 burns on different media ive probablie formed a fairly balanced view with info from pioneer to back it up
if you still disbeleive try http://www.dvdwriters.co.uk you will find all you need to know check out reveiws

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: daren b on 2001-12-24 13:58:59 ]</font>

[Paule]

I use dirt cheap, no brand name media from http://www.meritline.com/ and succesully write DVD-R at 2x speed. Maybe your DVD writting software also a contributing factor. I use Recordnow Max to burn at least 50 dvd since October.

[lusid]

Hey Paule,
What players like your meriteline burns?

I've tested them in a Panasonic and a Mintek, neither would play them. But the Pioneer media works just fine in both.

I'm keeping them around to use for data, but even PC DVD drive compatability seems hit or miss with the meritline media. This really is like the early days of CDR.

[Paule]

Not that many DVD player work with DVD-RW even with Pioneer brand media.DVD-R and DVD-RW I bought from Mettline can be played on a $80 Shisonic from Best Buy. DVD-R is more or less 90% compatible with all players. Hope this help.

[Jason A]

daren b.........you must be on Crack !!!!

Show me a link to a PIONEER website that shows this info.

I'm in the same boat as everybody else...

I've used BOTTOM OF THE BARREL DVD-R's at $1.20 ea and my A03 has no problem recording at 2x...

FOr that matter, I've never had my A03 reject any media.

Jason

[leebo]

"DVD-R's at $1.20 ea"

Where?????

[McChicken]

The DVD-R's are not the problem. I tried different brands and they all write at 1x speed.
So I checked with the guy that sells me the DVD-R's and he told me that he has the same burner and writes everything at 2 speed with the same brands I use.

I also read at a forum on another site that it is a firmware problem. The newer firmwares don't write at 2 speed.
Can anybody tell me if this is true and if they are using firmware older than 1.55.
If eveybody who is writing at 2 speed is using a lower firmware it is true I guess.
But what can I do then? Wai for pioneer the be nice and fix the firmware again?
Can I downgrade my firmware?

[disturbed1]

My Pioneer shipped with an older firware, burned 2x on all Pioneer media.

Upgraded firmware to 1.55, still burns Pioneer's (DVS-R470SD)at 2x, and TDK's (DVD-R47S) at 2x. Haven't had a reason to try the generics yet.

I use Primo DVD.

Firmware 1.65 is out anyway, get it here http://www.pioneer-eur.com/support/

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: disturbed1 on 2001-12-25 03:19:58 ]</font>

[daren b]

jason a you must be one of the lucky ones who seem to have a rogue ao3
pioneer have no link for this information as its been kept under wraps for obvious reasons so they can sell more media to recoupe their development costs if you read earlier post you will see a link that reveiwed ao3 and if you read this you will see that they had same probs with 1x write on most unbranded media
also check out most good firmware forums and you will find on these peaple with same prob
i also know 3 other peaple 1 in canada 2 in uk and myself who have this prob
this info i got from pioneer tech in uk after a long conversation with their top tech who didnt even know this himself when he was checking my ao3 after it had been returned because of slow writing speed with some media when he aproached pioneer themselves about this he was told he then told me and sent my ao3 back as it didnt need fixing
i have tried
primo dvd as shipped with canadian ao3
vob ver 6 as shipped with uk a03
gearsoft gearpro dvd ver 203
nero 5064
all wrote at 1x with tdk vivastar and unbranded that i have
i havnt tried the cheap media your using so cant comment on that
dont knock peaple with this problem its the ao3 to blame so if you want 2x use pioneer authorised media at extra cost

[r-brook]

I can not write at 2x... I am using a Pioner 103 drive with the 168 firmware.... My friend has a Pioneer drive that can write at 2x... I borrowed one of his dic and I still could not burn at 2x....

[swaffs]

hi guys, i'm also only a 1X burner
I am using princo cheap dvd-r's I have used the pioneer DVD-r when I first got it with Nero and I think it only burned at 1 speed also but cannot confirm that, it was a ahile ago.
I use Prassi Primo DVD / Spruce up and it gives an option to burn at 2 speed but only goes at 1.
my firmware is 1.55
mine was brought in th UK, if that makes a difference.

[RAAGAAman]

Jason I agree with DarenB the A03 and A04 will only burn at 2X on media that is approved by Pioneer. Right now that is Pioneer, Apple, TDK, Verbatim and Mitsui. BTW, Apple media is MFG by Pioneer. Have you actually timed a write with one of these other medias? Your S/W could be lying to you when it says its writing at 2X.

RG

[r-brook]

Let's Put this debate to sleep.... I just bought 4 Pioneer 103 DV-R drives.. They shipped we the new 1.68 Firmware... I just built out a a NW P4 2ghz pc running Win 2000 sp 2.. I installed all 4 drives and Nero.. My Nero max 7 burner at once software has not come in yet.. But I can burn successfully at 1x speed on 2 drives at once.... Even if I try just one burner, I can not write at anything but 1x.. Nero won't even give me a 2x option using princo dvd-r's.... I called Pioneer... they said that it was most likely the media... Yesterday I went to the store and bout a Pioneer DVD-r disc for $11.99 + tax... I put the pioneer disc in and... All of a sudden I get the option to write at 2x......... There you have it....... If you have a burner that writes at 2x on all media consider yourself lucky.....

Now that I have helped put that to rest.... I have a problem of my own... The Princo dvd-r's that I am using will work fine in my standalone DVD player but once i put it in my PS2, the disc will spin up for a while and then attempt to play bits and peices with no audio.... Is there a problem with the media or the way I am burning???

[jethro]

:evil:
Ok Let me set this record straight. Has anyone stopped to think it could be something else within your system(S) that is bunck, ie cables, proccesor, lack of any resource needed??

I have a total of 7 a03's that are in 7 diff systems here, all were baught at seperte times and have varying firmware versions. All are using primo to write and we have used Pioneer, TDK, Memorex, Maxell, Apple and random cheap dvd-r's picked up at the local frys.
ALL SYSTEMS WRITE AT 2X. NO ISSUES, 1 COASTER OUT OF ABOUT 1000+ discs made!

These systems range from an athlon 700 with 256 of ram up to a quad xeon with 4 gigs of ram. all with varying other pieces of hardware.

I dont know why people are having issues with this thing...

[r-brook]

My system is put together right..
I am Running a Northwood Intel P4 2.0ghz (Overclocked to 2.3ghz)
1 gig of Kingston 266 DDR 2100 ram
100 gig Scsi raid array
4 Pioneer 103 DVD-r burners (2 connected to the on board IDE controller & 2 connected to a ATA 133 controller
I am using a Abit motherboard with the Intel 845 chipset..
No other software has been installed pc but Windows 2000, sp2, DVD decrypter, Ifoedit, DVD2AVI, and the full version of Nero... I have changed all ide cable to new round IDE cables... All drivers installed are the latest versions... What could possibly be wrong.... How can you explain the fact that I can put in a pioneer disc and the 2x option becomes available, when I put in a princo disc the 2x option goes away. Even when I do a CTRL+R in nero and bring up the "choose recorder" screen... While in this screen i put a Princo dvd-r in the drive the "Maximum CD Speed = 6x ... When I put the Pioneer DVD-r in the "Maximum CD Speed = 12x.... Please explain that...... If you have a dvd-r that burn 2x on all media then consider yourself lucky... BTW I have a friend that also have a Pioneer drive, He said that his drive burn at 2x on all the disc... So what we did was time it... If the drive is burning at 2x then it will complete a full dvd-r in 30min or less... Well we timed it,,, His drive took as long to burn as mine did 45 min to an hour... I think that pioneer made the mistake with earlier models of the DVD-r drive reporting the wrong speed... They have probably fixed the issue and now the drive will report what it is actually going to write at...

[imel6]

Ugh, this is a nightmare thread...here is the truth.
Pioneer has a list of approved media written in the firmware of your burner. If you use a piece of media from the approved list it will write at 2x; if not it will only write a 1x. Your burner looks at the header of the media to determine who the manufacturer is and determines the maximum write speed accordingly.
Calm down now..
Generic media can have the same manufacturer as those in the approved list and have the same media code as those on the approved list thereby allowing the higher write speed. You can use this utility to determine who the manufacturer of your media is http://pioneerdvd.firmware-flash.com/ADVDInfo.zip
Here is the approved list of media from the latest media:
PVC001001
MCIG01
TDKG010000d9
MCC 00RG200
MXL RG01
TDKG02000000

Ok, hope this helps.

[imel6]

Oh yeah, and of course if anyone can recommend some generic media that burns at 2x and their source (where they bought them), I'd be greatful. (BTW, although a bit haughty in demeanor, I didn't mean for my previous post to be the definitive answer though I am fairly certain from research).

[ampolibe]

You may find this of inerest:

I do not have dvr but I have noticed with cdrws that I use that they have speed range within which you can burn them. They have this clearly stated on the packaging. So if you wanted to use your 10x allowance of your burner for cdrw media, you have to buy cdrws that conform to this - on my market you can buy 4-16x ones.

This is also confirmed by the burning software that matches exactly the max speed stated on the media itself: so 2x speed cdrws will have only 2x speed allowance in the burning software. I think this goes almost as far that you would not be able to use 4-16x speed media in 2x speed burners.

Maybe you guys should check with the media producers what speeds the media support, and, aproved media or not, I bet what they produce as 2x speed media will burn as such.

[lusid]

Another tidbit, for those who say theirs burns at 2x on everything.

The burning software that shipped with my drive, Primo-DVD, always says it is burning at 2x. But burning a full disc on Pioneer media takes about 30 minutes, and on generic media it takes about an hour.

[byrdmaniac69]

My dvr-103 using 1.65 firmware burns cd-recodrable.com dvd-r's at 2x using ulead dvd movie factory and only 1x using same dvd-r in nero 5.5.7.8. I tried the trial of record now max 4 and it starts out listing all generic media tried, ie cd-recordable and dvdpro and purple dvd-r's at 1.99 from supermediastore.com as 2x capable but when it tries to burn I get an error and a bad disc message. I got same message using a generic dvd-rw after record now erased the rw dvd and gave me the 1x speed capable message for -rw. I know that ulead recorded at 2x because I timed it, makes absolutely no sense after what I have read in this post.

[Malcom]

Game over, man:

http://www.pioneerelectronics.com/Pioneer/Files/DVDR2Xmedia_statement.pdf

Read 'em and weep.