Hi,

this drive could either be a rebadged DW 1640 or a 1650, so there is a 50% chance to kill the drive. Please do some searching here in the Benq section as there are several threads about crossflashing a Sony 810 here.

Michael
btw: it is absolutely not necessary to write in bold and italic.

Brave ones still wanna try this, read this thread carefully first.

When label says "810A-R" its for sure DW1650 equivalent.

BTW, welcome to cdfreaks.

Mine is certainly a Sony DRU-810A without a R .It is a rebadged BenQ DW1640. I know that Sony DRU-810A has been crossflashed b4 to the BenQ DW1640 but what i m stressing on is the particular firmware that i have. so what i wanna know is whether i can flash a Sony DRU-810A with firmware v1.0f to Benq DW1640 firmware vBSRB?? Plz help( moderators especially)

As long you are sure this is a DW1640 equivalent you can flash it with any 1640 firmware you like.

There has been some confusion in the past because Sony firmware package (1.0e, 1.0f) contain binaries for both types of drives (810A and 810A-R), but this has nothing to do with you question.

BTW, anyone here can answer this, moderators included.

If you're so sure that your Sony DRU-810A without the "R" is a rebadged 1640 then crossflash your drive to the official Benq 1640 firmware by using BQFlasher or WinDWFlash. For 1640 you would crossflash with any of the 1640 firmwares and it would the same for the 1650 firmwares if your drive is a 1650.

Read carefully the BQFlasher thread:
http://club.cdfreaks.com/showthread.php?t=149980

Another thing i wanted to know was that whether it has any advantage coz the last fimware release for the benq dw1640 was done long back whereas the Sony DRU-810 1.0f fimware has been released recently(25th March,2007). So which is better?? the added feature of Q-suite after flashing the benq firmware or staying with the latest Sony firmware?

Release date for rebadged drives firmware like Sony 810A/-R has nothing to do with date when latest retail DW1640 firmware was released. It's a known pattern (fact) that Sony (and other OEM's/rebadges) being quite slow when it comes to firmware updates.
And one more thing to consider, how do we know this is an update related to DW1640? It might be some old update for 1650 as well...

I've been running my 1640 on Sony firmware with good results. QSuite? Most functions will work but SolidBurn doesn't seem to be supported, although I'm not that sure about that.

If you are happy with your "@Sony" burns then stay with that.
As BenQ freaks maybe we are too colored, liking all the bells and whistles just for the fun of it.
But then, in the end it's your choice.

10X a lot all of you for ur timely expert advice. Dis is da first time i ever posted on any forum and i m happy dat i have cum to the rite place. To see like minded ppl here who are into optical drives is even more fun. Keep da good work goin 4ever.

I crossflashed my Sony with the Benq dw1640 firmware. After doing so the LED stays on all the time as long as der is any media in the drive. Also Q-Suite doesn't seem to be working. To chek my drive's status i burnt a DVD using Nero and it showed the successful completion of da burn process. But as i inserted this DVD back on to the drive it was empty. I thought my drive is dead now. I reverted back to the Sony firmware v 1.0d(.cvt) and den again updated it to 1.0f. Again i burnt da same DVD and the burn process was successful again and this time data was present on the disc. Dunno wat went rong but i m happy dat in the end my drive is still in working condition. Nevertheless the whole process was fun coz i m doin it for the first time.

P.S.:I crossflashed the drive using WinDWFlash. I thought it is important to mention this.

Should i try to flash my drive using BQFlash??

I don't understand why you want to flash your drive with BQFlasher now? If using WinDWFlasher didn't work with 1640 firmware then your drive could be a 1650. You can use WinDWFlash to flash to 1650 firmware as well but you'll need the cvt files for that. Here's a link for them but I believe you'll need to join in order to get the files downloaded.

http://dvd-rw.hoppy.tk/modules/wfdow...cat.php?cid=46

Hi
Update:
This drive has been successfully from a Sony 810 > BenQ 1640 & back again.
This was done using WinDWFlash & .cvt files for BenQ & Sony (supplied by me).
This rules out any likelyhood of crossflashing to a 1650. (Just ask Pinto2).
The fact the led stays on is typical of BenQ.
The QSuite problem has many ,more aspects as to why it doesn't function.
If wanting to 'get away' from the Sony approach, but not sure that BenQ's way is the one. Then Philips f/w is the only option left.

BTW. DVD_ADDICT you are correct that one needs to sign up in order to download files from that site.

Kinda wrong wording zebadee.
More correct; "This rules out any likelyhood of"... KILLING your drive, as I did. Just PM one of posters in this thread and we'll be able to provide almost any (BenQ/Philips/Sony) CVT firmware.

There's so many posts about cross flashing Sony/Philips to BenQ's is not funny

Agreed its not funny but i m a total newbie. I have started doing more research on this forum(getting used to this forum). Also the particular variant factor is giving problems as also the firmware version. Thats y rolling56.........

Welcome to CDF's
There's all kinds of info on most anything you need for an ODD. Flashing can get addicting Just make sure you have the correct drive and f/w when flashing

Hey da suun & da stars have finally shone on me. I have crossflashed my Sony DRU-810A(fw 1.0f) with BenQ DW1640(fw BSRB) with BQFlasher using the BSRB.cvt file provided by zebadee. This time it has worked perfectly. I also successfully burned a DVD and a CD after the process. All fine this time. Also seems like solidburn is working as well. Thank you once again all of you here especially zebadee. I more than just happy.

A sony 810A (not the 810A-R) can be crossflashed with any BenQ DW1640 firmware...
After crossflash an up- or downgrade of firmware is not a problem. BSLB is still the most popular firmware, from what I can see.

BTW, once you have a .cvt firmware you can always crossflash with WinDWFlash.

Good luck with your new firmware ronello. You can also crossflash back to Sony firmware whenever you like.

Here's a question...

I have two drives currently flashed as a BenQ DW1640 BSRB. One was an OEM drive purchased under the Norwood Micro brand. The other is a Sony DRU-810A that I recently acquired on eBay (advertised as new, never opened, turned out to be neither, but that's another story). I flashed the Sony from 1.0a to 1.0e, then to BSRB with BQFlasher.

I expected them to be nearly identical, and for a while, I thought they were. But then I noticed that the former Sony did not have all of the same write strategies. In particular, when I tried to burn a cheapo AML002 disc, it burned at 4x instead of 8x, and the results were horrible. I fired up QSuite to verify that both drives were configured the same. They were, except on the Sony, AML002 showed up as a learned disc. I have SolidBurn at the default settings; i.e., activated only for unknown discs. While doing this, I also noticed that the LED flashed at a different cadence during burning (about twice as fast on the Sony).

How can this be? I figured since they had the same firmware, they'd know all the same media and have the same write strategies.