Well folks the duplicator arrived it is made up from a 9 bay case, fitted with the DVD-2000 controller made by WYTRON.



The case is of heavy gauge steel a lot thicker than the average PC.

The unit was supplied with 6 x PIONEER A04 DVD-R/RW and 1 x ULTIMA DHI G40 DVD-ROM drives. The duplicator has 8 IDE controllers and can only be connected in Master mode. None of the controllers support 2 drives so up to 8 devices only can be connected.



IDE 1 & 2 can both be used for the DVD-ROM reader HARD DRIVE or DVD-R/RW whereas IDE 3,4,5,6,7 & 8 are for the DVD-R/RW drives.
The controller has 32meg ram on board.
The unit I have for review has 6 x PIONEER A04 DVD-R/RW and 1 x ULTIMA DHI G40 DVD-ROM drives.
The ULTIMA DVD-ROM drive was unsuitable for reading my PANASONIC DMR-E20 recordings so for the purpose of the review I have changed it for a SAMSUNG DVD-ROM drive which is fitted in the spare bay at the bottom of the unit.



I switched on the unit, the display flashed quickly with the make WYTRON and the revision number. The drive lights flickered until they are all detected and the drive makes are shown in the display then the default mode "COPY" is shown in the display.

Using the unit is simply just insert the master in the DVD-ROM drive the display will show the size of the disc in megs.

Place blank DVD-R/RW DISCS into the DVD writers, when all the writers detect the DVD’s the duplicator will automatically start copying. If fewer copies are required just place the required number of blank DVD-R/RW discs into the writers until the desired number is indicated in the display, press the GO button and the copy process will start manually. Any of the writers can be used in any order
When the copying is complete the good discs will be ejected and the failed ones will remain in the drives until manually ejected. All functions are locked until the failed discs are ejected DVD-RW discs containing data can also be written to by the duplicator. DVD-RW discs with data stored on them are subject to a quick erase prior to recording, this is automatic and there are no special settings for this.

Well simple copying is easy just put the source disk in the reader put the required number of blanks in the writers and press the "GO" button: that’s it!

For the experienced users there are other functions
Copy + Compare. This compares the copied disc with the original for errors.
Emulate: This emulates the copy process without actually writing to the discs it does however do a quick erase on any rewritable’s that are in the writers.
Emulate & Copy: This emulates the copy process and if all is OK the copy process is started. This is handy for unattended copying if the master is suspect, it will not start copying if any read errors occur.
Compare: This will enable comparison of master & copied discs.
Quick Erase: Allows quick erase of rewritable discs in the writers.
Verify: This verifies that the discs can be read any disc can be in any of the drives for verification the do not have to be the same.

I fitted a 20gig hard drive to the spare IDE connecter to check the hard drive function. On switching back on the Disc to Disc function is not immediately selected but hard drive image copy to disc is the default. The hard drive had been split into 4 equal sections which were labelled AA, AB, AC, AD. The hard drive partition is selected from the setup menu, the default being AA. (Checking the hard drive on a PC to see what had been done showed up as unpartitioned with nothing on it even though there were 4 DVD images on it.)

Inserting the master disc did nothing until the mode was changed to load when it loads the disc image onto the hard drive, this took about 10 minutes with a full 4.7 DVD after which it is ejected.

Reinserting another DVD in the reader without altering the mode caused it to load the image again and overwrite the one on it.

Change the mode to copy and the image on the hard drive is available for copying, Insert the required number of blanks and press the GO button to start the copying if the all the writers have blanks inserted then the copying will start automatically.

The Setup mode is selected by holding the mode button for 5 seconds. The following functions are then available:
Edit: This function is not available for DVD it is used for CD Audio in the CD controller.
Delete: This function is not available for DVD it is used for CD Audio in the CD controller.
Clear: This clears the data stored on the currently selected partition of the hard drive and is performed by pressing the go button.

Copy X 1:This is supposed to limit the copy speed to 1 X irrespective of the type of disc used. It indicates copy 1x but when 2x discs are inserted it copies at 2x.
Emulate X 1: This is supposed to limit the emulating speed to 1 X irrespective of the type of disc used. It indicates Emulate 1x but when 2x discs are inserted it Emulates at 2x.
Copy X 2: This is supposed to limit the copy speed to 2 X.
Emulate X 2: This is supposed to limit the emulating speed to 2 X.
Copy X 4: This is supposed to limit the copy speed to 4 X Presumably in anticipation of faster writers.
Emulate X 4: This is supposed to limit the emulating speed to 4 X.
Copy X 8: This is supposed to limit the copy speed to 8 X Presumably in anticipation of faster writers.
Emulate X 8: This is supposed to limit the emulating speed to 8 X.

THE BURN SPEED SETTINGS DO NOT FUNCTION AS THEY SHOULD DO ON THIS CONTROLLER

Burn in: This is a burn in test function which runs the emulator continuously without actually burning the discs are ejected between cycles then reloaded.
Update: This allows the use of a bios CD to be used to update the firmware of the controller.
Show Drives: This gives information on the drives installed Make, Model & Firmware.
HD Partition Group Gives details on the hard drive group and the partitions and enables selection of the required partition.
CD to CD: This function enables selection of Disc to Disc copying instead of HD image copying, It is only an option when a hard drive is installed and resets to NO after a power down. Without a hard drive disc to disc copying is automatically selected as there is no alternative.
Start Writers: This gives the function to limit the maximum number of writers so that the copy process starts automatically when the selected number of drives have writable media in them.
Write Method: This changes the default method from 'Disk at Once' to 'Track at Once'.
Write Speed: This is set to Max but can be altered up to 48 presumably these being for CD writers and have no function with this controller.
CD Rom Drive: This enables selection of which DVD-rom drive is used for the reader.
Autoloader: This is when an external device with autoloader is used. The function is not available on this unit.
Load non blank disc: This function is for use with an autoloader and is not available on this unit.
CD-DA Load Speed: This function is for audio CD and is not available with this unit.
Eject Disc: this selects whether the discs are ejected after successful write.
Buzzer: Selects whether the buzzer sounds on completion.
CD+G: This function is for CG+G format CD’s and is not available with this unit.
Copycomp Eject: Selects whether the disc is ejected between the write and compare function.
Read CDDA index: Not used for DVD.
Skip Read Error: If selected can be used to copy discs that have errors on them.
Mode 2 Compare: Used for comparing data on mode 2 discs.
Start-up command: Used to select the default start-up mode the default mode is COPY.

For simple DVD copying most of these functions can be left as is and copying is simple put the master disc in the reader put the blanks in the writers and press "GO" can’t be much simpler.

I have tested various combinations of mixed discs both –R & -RW and it will accept and burn 6 different brands at the same time, erasing the –RW before commencing the burns.
The media compatibility is the same as using the writers in a PC and the copies produced are the same as copies done disc to disc on the PC.

Mixing 1x & 2 x media with the same burn does however give problems, the duplicator selects the first IDE bus that has a disk and if it is 2x it attempts to burn all the discs at 2x resulting in a fail of any 1x discs in the other drives.(The 1x discs are not written to.)

If the first disk is 1x it will record all discs at 1x and any 2x disc try to write at 2x but because the buffer is working at 1x with the other discs the 2x write is interrupted and buffer underun must kick in, this can be seen by the led’s on these drives flickering continuously during the burn I had one drive give up after about 80% burn.

The A04 drives supplied with this unit had a mixture of firmware 1.20 & 1.30 which initialy did not seem to give problems, at 1x speed there is no problem but at 2x the mismatch in firmware caused some discs to faulter after about ½ the burn so all the firmware on all the drives need to be the same.

This can only be done in a PC so all the drives have to be removed from the duplicator to have their firmware updated.

Conclusion
This unit is very simple to use and once set up to your requirements it can be operated by almost anyone. The controller only has 2 buttons on it making the operation simplicity itself.
The case is very robust and neat looking.
This unit will make a welcome addition to any DVD copying set up.

Thanks to Flash for this review.

Added:  Tuesday, September 10, 2002
Reviewer:  Flash

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