all,
maria wrote in a private message : "............
i originally asked a question because the dvd drive i got in my laptop (the same as your one i believe- HL-DT-ST DVD-RW GWA-4082N) would only let me burn my sony dvd+rw 4x speed disk (sony s11Manufacturer Code: 10DPW120AS2 made in taiwan) at 2.4 speed. the problem apperently was the firmware was not upto date and i couldnt get the updated firmware because LG only supports the retail version of the drive (how rubbish is that?!).. which dvd dsks would you recommend for this drive? perhaps you have an updated firmware which would be very useful?
DISCinfo says firmware version for my drive is- CL02
............."
since i'm not much into burning, i cannot asses marias performance specs ;
i use the above drive for DVD-reading and RW-backups - and it IS slow, but
i must stress that my configuration allows NO UDMA. since the drive is
"illegally" sitting as slave on the second ATA controller channel, windows lets
it use only Multi-word-mode2 access.

maria,
when you start 3 threads, you tend to lose overview. in short :
1. notebooks were not meant as mainstream appliences, but rather for people
to work in the field - thus their devices cannot be compared with those of
desktops.
2. i think you never answered the question if the drive came with your
notebook - please do so. if it did, then your only SAFE source is the
notebook manufacturer. if it didnot, then you MAY be having the same
problem as i am - namely that of BIOS recognition for the drive.
can you BOOT from the drive ?? - if you can, then your drive is correctly
connected to the system.
3. GWA-4082 is a recent model and i don't think you'll NOW get a newer
firmware than both you and i already have : CL02. no matter which media
you use, expect half the speed of a desktop-drive for the same media.
LG recommends (and i use) for most of its drives - here simplified :
DVD+R/RW = verbatim, DVD-R = maxell, DVD-RW = JVC .
*please note that i'm not an expert at this,- for my usage it suffices.
for best compatibility with players/other drives, use '-R' (=maxell) ;
if you need 'RW', use '+RW' (=verbatim).