I've been burning discovery discs in ImgBurn trying to find the best speeds for a few types of DVD media I have. The burns have been less than stellar with my 3-year old CompUSA BenQ DW1655 (upgraded to BCIB) but they've been acceptable most of the time. A couple of days ago, I started getting I/O errors repeatedly at either the 50% point or right at the end of a burn. Some on burns as slow as 2x. I also started seeing more PIE and PIF on media that burned better than that previously. Last night, I got several Power Calibration Area Is Full messages and the burns wouldn't even start. I cleaned the drive and some threads pointed me to check the IMAPI service in Windows (up to date XP Home, SP2) which was stopped. I restarted it and rebooted before I started getting Unrecoverable Read Errors during the verify process in ImgBurn. I finally tried a 16x Taiyo Yuden (TYG03) disc that burned very well a few days ago. Same read errors at first and eventually got a complete but very poor burn at 8x. Significant PIE and PIF in the first 250MB. Given the sudden string of error messages on three different media, I suspect my burner is toast. Does anyone have any other suggestions before I trash this drive? If I must replace it, what's a good choice? I don't use the LightScribe feature often, but I like having it available, not to mention the 50 or so LightScribe discs I have. I'd also like something that will support most of the DVD Speed tests. At the moment, I'm trying to use the following media:

CMC MAG M01 (Imation 16x SL +R with matte AquaGuard hub printable surface)
RICOHJPN D01-67 (Moser Baer 8x DL +R with glossy AquaShield hub printable surface)
TYG03 (Taiyo Yuden 16x SL -R with matte WaterShield hub printable surface)

I haven't retried the 8x Optical Quantum TTH02's that gave me the best burns at 16X a week ago but I'm tired of wasting discs on what appears to be a failing drive.

I really wasn't planning to investigate a new burner in the middle of testing media, but it's evidently not my option. I'd prefer to find something that might be available locally at Best Buy or Circuit City (or ???) so I can get through this replacement process quickly.

I expect the first recommendations will be buy better media, but the lesser media burned fine until a couple of days ago and even TY won't burn well anymore.

I really need some recommendations here.

Thanks.

Ray

I suggest you try flashing the drive back to firmware BCGB or BCDB - there are too many bugs in the BCIB and BCHB firmwares for my liking.

If the drive still doesn't work properly with BCGB or BCDB firmware then you can look for a new drive.

Thanks DrageMester. I downgraded to BCGB and tried another Taiyo Yuden TYG03 at 16x. The results were pretty much the same as a few days ago. 24 max PIE, 8 max PIF, 11.6% max jitter. I also tried a Moser Baer DL RICOHJPN-D01-67 at 4x. At 50% (outer edge of disc), I got a write error. Tried another of the same disc at 8x. Same write error. I know these aren't top of the line discs but I was getting acceptable (playable) results (14 PIF, 106 PIE) until a few days ago. Now, I can't get a complete burn. I guess I could try the BCDB firmware.

i recommend the asus drw-2014L1 burner.

OptiArc 720x or Pioneer DVR-215 would be a good choices

One of the new LiteOn drives is your best option if scanning is important. I'd choose a Pioneer 115D if scanning isn't important and if only quality of burn is important.

theres also an lg that circuit city has.

http://www.circuitcity.com/ssm/LG-In...oductDetail.do

that's the one that i was mentioning nots3w, at circuit city.

I'm sorry I was busy with another matter these last few days and didn't see your responses. I ended up buying two new burners a couple of weeks ago. At the time, I couldn't find anything local that could come close to the online prices, so I bought a Samsung SH-S203N and a Pioneer DVR-215D with a SATA controller from Newegg. I moved my old BenQ DW1655 to an external USB 2.0 enclosure for scanning only but the cheap chipset in the enclosure prevents decent TRT scans above about 12x from the BenQ now.

I really like the Pioneer. The only reason I bought the Samsung is that I'd read of successes burning RICOHJPN D01 media on that drive and I have some of those DL discs that I want to use because of their printable surface. They burn as well (not perfect, but acceptable) in the Pioneer as in the Samsung, so I may not have needed the Samsung after all. As it turns out, I think I'm only tormenting myself by trying to get very good scans out of those discs (I've a separate thread about that) and it's been recommended that I don't even bother quality scanning them. So maybe the BenQ wasn't in need of replacement, but it was a good excuse to buy some new hardware.

The window of opportunity is still open to exchange the Sammy for something that will do good scans without relying on the external connection.

@ pepst: If I were to do that, which of these would be the bext choice?

Optiarc AD-7200S-0B (I need at least one LightScribe drive, so the 7201x would be better, but I can only find the IDE version in the States)

Optiarc AD-7191S-0B (A little slower on -R DL, but it is SATA and LightScribe)

LiteOn LH-020A1L-05 (SATA and LightScribe)

Thanks.

Ray

For scanning the LiteOn is your best option as stated in my post #6, and the Optiarc AD-7200 series would be best if you decide to go Optiarc unless you want to risk the -R read issue detailed at http://club.cdfreaks.com/f86/nec-opt...oblems-209168/. That's because I saw a Dee 27 post that said the -R read problem hasn't been reported for the 7200 series.

I didn't mean to ignore your earlier suggestion, bevills1. I have gathered that Optiarc is near the top of the heap in this range of drives although I've also read that BenQ, LiteOn and Plextor are the best for scanning. I take it you're saying that the LiteOn LH-020A1L-05 would be better than the Optiarc AD-7201S-0B for scanning. Or would you say they're equally good for that. What about as a burner? Still the LiteOn over the Optiarc?

The 7200 scans without jitter and it's results aren't totally comparable with Benq or LiteOn results, however it's a decent CD scanner most likely. The 20A1L should be a good scanner at 4x on DVDs, but it's worthless for scanning CDs. The NEC would be good for TRTs also while LiteOns tend to be worthless for TRTs.

Hello, I would choose a LiteOn, since the Optiarc is quite similar to Pioneer. LiteOn is a litttle bit better reader and allows quality scanning