The BATTLE of the BURNERS

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I was fortunate enough to be supplied with some more Dual Layer DVD Samples and this time the discs are Verbatim 2.4x speed so I was eager to see if these discs live up to the Verbatim reputation for quality. The discs are individually jewel case wrapped & cellophane sealed, breaking the seal is quite troublesome and wasteful but I suppose this must be compensated for by the protection it gives to these expensive discs. The disc is a matt silver/gold colour with a silver inner ring and transparent centre. The dye is a mid mauve colour with a gold inner ring separating it from the clear centre. The disc edge is smooth and slightly bevelled to remover the sharp edges

The media code identifies the disc as MKM 001

08 02 00 00 E1 0F 32 10 00 03 00 00 00 FC FF FF ......2.........
00 22 D8 00 00 00 00 4D 4B 4D 00 00 00 00 00 30 .".....MKM.....0
30 31 00 40 25 25 37 0C 02 2F 63 02 2F 63 21 23 01.@%% 7../C./C!#
0D 0E 14 14 02 01 01 10 00 21 23 0D 0E 14 14 02 .........!#.....

Although this media is certified as 2.4x speed the Pioneer & the NEC both reported 4x speed burning capabilities, but for the purpose of the test I burnt the disc at 2.4 x speed in all of the drives.

I created a title set backup of one of my movies and made it less than 10megs off the maximum size that can be burnt to this media which is 7.96gig and then Using VSO CopyToDVD I burnt the same movie to a disc in each of my Dual Layer drives in turn. The burnt disc was tested in two of my PC DVD drives, The Teac for PIE/PIF errors and the Pioneer for the read speed test and can be seen as a direct comparison to the previous D/L tests with the RITEKD01 media. The scaling of the graphs in my test results have been adjusted to make them all the same scale so that a direct visual comparison can be made. And here are my results.

PIONEER DVR-108 V1.14

The Pioneer burn, PIE shows a smooth graph of under 5 up to just before the layer change where it rises steadily to just under 20 and then a smooth switch dropping back down to under 5 the single spike in the second layer is not high at 47 and has no effect on playback The PIE average is very good at 4 The PIF errors show a similar pattern with a marginal increase in the second layer The burn time for this disc was 44m03sec

The read speed graph carried out in the Pioneer drive shows a smooth graph with no glitches at the layer changeover, all of my burns with this media produced a similar graph.

NEC ND-3500AG

This graph is about the same as the Pioneer with no peak at the layer changeover and the second layer PIE is better than the first with an average of 5. PIF shows a few more errors in the second layer but marginal The burn time for this disc was 43m06sec

Again an Ideal graph

MEMOREX DVDDLRWL1 F16 vBWSE

PIE has one minor spike in the second layer but no glitches at the layer change. Again the average is only 4 & PIF is negligible The burn time for this disc was 43m18sec

Again an Ideal graph

BENQ DW1620

Surprising the BenQ comes out the worst in this test with a PIF average of 16 several major spikes and a peak of 40 at the layer change point. PIF also peaks at 21 at the layer change point. Although these readings are higher than the rest they are not excessive and the burn is still good it is just that the rest are excellent and this is no cause for concern. The burn time for this disc was 46m08sec

Again an Ideal graph

LITEON SOHW1633S

A very good graph indeed from the Liteon burn with PIE averaging 4 and the PIF negligible but slightly more in the second layer The burn time for this disc was 43m17sec

Again an Ideal graph

TEAC DV-W516G

The burn failed after 20 minutes with the following error message

09/10/2004 19:23:36 error Writeerror detected at sector 1980784 (16) - Trying to recover ...
09/10/2004 19:23:38 error WriteSector failed at sector 1980784 (16) - Code 05 21 02 [Illegal request, Invalid address for Write]
09/10/2004 19:23:38 info Finalizing C D..
09/10/2004 19:23:43 info Total burning time 00:20:12.219
09/10/2004 19:23:43 info Average speed x2.34 Reference x1 = 1385.00 kbps
09/10/2004 19:23:43 error Write failed

So far I have been unable to successfully burn any Dual Layer media with this drive with its current firmware. The drive is the same as the Liteon & the Memorex apart from the firmware so it should write OK to Dual Layer media with the correct firmware.

Conclusion

All the successful burns with this media produced discs that read back perfect and there were only minor differences in the PIE/PIF error charts produced with the worst graph from the Benq still a very good graph. The burning time was around 45 mins with a maximum difference of only 3m02secs between the fastest and the slowest.

Playback of the discs was checked in a DK digital DVD-339 player and the playback was good with a slight skip at the layer changeover which is typical of all the Dual Layer media I have tested and does not distract too much from the pleasure of watching the films.

If you want to use Dual Layer media for backups of your treasured movies and are not concerned about the cost then this is the media to buy, but make sure you have a DVD Player like the DK Digital capable of playing back the dual Layer media.

Added:  Monday, October 11, 2004
Reviewer:  Flash
Related web link:  RITEKD01 Dual Layer Tests
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