Holiday Shopping Roundup: Eight Dual Format Recordable DVD Drives
by Kristopher Kubicki on December 11, 2003 10:54 PM EST- Posted in
- Storage
MSI DR4-A
MSI took their time entering the DVD recordable market. You may recall that MSI has traditionally been one of the largest producers of optical storage products in the world! (This probably stemmed from their ability to produce drives cheaper than LiteOn without sacrificing too much quality). Like ASUS and Pioneer, the MSI DR4-A shares virtually the same specifications, chipset and bundle as the Sony DRU-510A. MSI already has a newer 8X burner comparable to the Sony DRU-530, which we will look at in a later roundup.MSI's DR4-A does not seem up to par with their excellent line of motherboards. The media bundle was good — Sonic MyDVD and Ahead Nero's Burning Rom. Unfortunately, the single page of documentation that came with the drive was disappointing, to say the least. It looks as though MSI spent more time on the box art than what they put in the box.
| MSI DR4-A DVD-/+R Drive | |
| Interface | IDE |
| CD Write Speed | 24X, 16X, 12X, 8X, 4X (CLV) |
| CD Rewrite Speed | 10X, 4X (CLV) |
| CD Read Speed | 40X Max (CAV) |
| DVD-R Write Speed | 4X, 2X, 1X (CLV) |
| DVD-RW Rewrite Speed | 2X, 1X (CLV) |
| DVD+R Write Speed | 4X, 2.4X (CLV) |
| DVD+RW Rewrite Speed | 2.4X (CLV) |
| DVD Read Speed | 12X Max (CAV) |
| Supported Modes | DAO / DAO-RAW 16 & 96 TAO SAO / SAO 16 & 96 Packet Write Multi-Session |
| Supported Formats | DVD+R (incremental) DVD+RW (random) DVD-R (DAO, incremental, multi-border) DVD-RW (restricted overwrite) CD-R, CD-RW, CD-ROM, CD-DA, CD-ROM XA, Mixed Mode, CD Extra Photo CD, CD Text, Bootable CD, Mount Rainer |
| Access Time | CD: 160ms DVD: 200ms |
| Buffer | 8MB |
We enjoyed the fact that MSI/Sony went with an 8MB buffer on their 4X dual capable drives. Even though critics and skeptics argue that larger buffers will not help when it comes to burning a DVD, we feel that the proof is in the pudding. It costs the manufacturer literally a few cents to add a slightly larger buffer, but the benefit of lower errors pays off.
Our MSI burner was based on the LC99390K chipset, and used the same in the Sony DRU-510A. With the announcement of their DR8-A just last week, MSI will begin to phase back on the DR4-A some time after the holiday season. Unfortunately, for those of you who bought a DR4-A, your burner was only new for 4 months before it became obsolete.
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rms - Saturday, December 13, 2003 - link
Why was there no identification/information on the physical drive used in these products? I'm disappointed.rms
artifex - Saturday, December 13, 2003 - link
Have you noticed that if you rip the ISO with DVDD, you need to burn it with that? I had trouble reading a DVD that I burned using Nero, but when I went back to DVDD for the burn it worked fine.KristopherKubicki - Saturday, December 13, 2003 - link
I use K3B and DVDTools for linux as well. Nero is good, depends on what you end up doing with it though. For ISOs and GIs, DVD Decryptor and Alcohol 120% are my particular choice of poisons.Cheers,
Kristopher
sprockkets - Saturday, December 13, 2003 - link
Haha, for some stupid reason that Sonic Software that came with my Lite On DVD+RW only drive said a new disc was already full or something stupid. Used nero from my other drive and works fine. Nero rocks, of course, under linux with SuSE and K3B and DVDtools it works fine too. Burns for me took around 13.5 min.KristopherKubicki - Friday, December 12, 2003 - link
Belzer, I emailed Nic about it. I was in fact using 2.24Kristopher
artifex - Friday, December 12, 2003 - link
Hmmm turns out my drive is identical to the BTC 1004IM. What can I say? I don't see any drives using that base in the comparison either, though I hardly feel prejudiced against, like the Lite-On people :)Anyway, looks like it does what I need it to, even has Mount Rainier support (My RW5125A didn't according to DVDinfoPro), for 1/2 the Plextor or Sony, so I should live with it for a while, right? I mean... I'm used to burning DVDs at 2.4x anyway, and now I can use the - formats (yuck, if I have to).
Belzer - Friday, December 12, 2003 - link
Kristopher: I think the MCC 003 should be identified as 8x in the latest (2.24) version of DVDInfoPro too.artifex - Friday, December 12, 2003 - link
Jeez, over $10? They must have a built-in Hollywood tax planned.I decided I couldn't wait. Fry's had a weird "Emprex" +- brand on sale for $90 before tax here in Dallas. I figure for under $100, I'll not worry about burning it up before Blu-ray... or whatever competes against it.
I'll let you know how it works... so far I see the websites on the box don't have any info on the drive :( It does seem to have a reasonably complete set of software, though. If nothing else, I can use it a little while and exchange it.
KristopherKubicki - Friday, December 12, 2003 - link
Belzer: Youre probably right. In DVD Info Pro, I got this (14)http://images.anandtech.com/reviews/storage/roundu...
Looks like the discs are just ahead of their time ;)
Kristopher
Belzer - Friday, December 12, 2003 - link
Thanks for the update, Kristopher! Sorry if I sounded rude in my last post.About the Verbatim media:
MCC 001 = 2.4x, MCC 002 = 4x, MCC 003 = 8x
Check Philips' list with approved media:
http://www.licensing.philips.com/services/db/midco...
or check this thread:
http://www.cdrlabs.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=13821
or check Plextor's list of compatible media:
http://www.plextor.com/english/support/media_708Co...
or check for yourself with DVDIdentifier:
http://dvd.identifier.cdfreaks.com/
Verbatim probably hadn't the new 8x box art available yet so my guess is that they put the sample discs they sended to you in an old case.