Ok, I've searched and searched for info and after it all, I am just a little confused. From what I have read, this drive seems to have many problems.

My Problem is that I have been using Ritek G04 media for a while now and have had near 100% success with mu Lite-on LDW-411S.

Now that I got my Dell 8400 with the Philips DVD8631 drive, I tried to burn a DVD and it works on the computer but not in my stand alone DVD Player.... coasters!

I also noticed that the write speed will drom from 4x to 3x periodically (for 4x ritek G04) and from 8x to 6x (for Ritek G05) during the burn.

I assume that the current Philips firmware doesn't support Ritek Media... Is this right? Is it just a firmware issue or will this drive never support Ritek G04/G05?

I have read about a BenQ conversion based on more firmware support but there isn't too much info on how to do it and what are the consequences.

If I convert to BenQ firmware, will my drive be a BenQ??? Meaning, will I be able to use the BenQ standard flasher from then on? Or do I have to use all the little flash tools and .chk (spell?) files?

If I convert to a BenQ, will the BenQ support my Ritek G04/G05 Media?

Thanks, and sorry about all the questions.

-A

Philips and Benq drives are better with +dvd media than with -dvd media.
I suggest you try some +media. Use the bitsetting tool if nesessary for compatbility with your standalone dvd player. If you convert your drive into a Benq it's possible the results are better with the -media, but that's not garanteed.

revhigh,

If you go to the unofficial BenQ firmware site:
http://dvdpro.club.st/firmware/BENQ_FW.htm

Download the WinDWflash tool and the .cvt files you can flash your drive to BenQ in one step.
Then you will be able to use the standard BenQ flashers.

Thanks guys,

I flashed my Philips 8631 to an older BenQ 1620 firmware with WinDWflash and then I used the newest official BenQ flasher to see if everything was ok.

I am now running a BenQ DW1620 fw B7S9 drive. I have successfully created a 4X DVD-R (Ritek G04) and a 8x DVD-R (Ritek G05) in less than 8 minutes.

I am still getting the write speed drop but now it only goes from 8x to 6.8x. As long as the disk works, that's ok by me.

So, just so you all know. The newest fw for BenQ DW1620 supports Ritek DVD-R G04/G05 media.

I have also had the same issues with my Philips DVD8631 drive, and I followed the same steps with flashing the firmware of my drive to the BenQ firmware. My drive is now a BenQ DW1620 with firmware version B7T9, and it is working pretty well. I have burned Ritek 4X -R, Optodisc 16X -R, and Verbatim 16X +R media. I am going to replace the drive with a Plextor SATA drive since the motherboard that came with my Dell 8400 only has 1 IDE it can't do disc to disc copies very fast. I just thought I would share my experience, and thank those who took the time to post in this forum.

-soundbarrier

I have the Philips 8631 (dell) with BD10 firmware from Dell's web site. I have burned 2 ritek g03's 4x -r, 2 memorex 4x -r, and 2 Verbatim 16x +r dvd's. all play fine in my dvd players, and I bitset one using DVDCRYPTER to -rom. All play fine and look good on Kprobe.

I have the Philips 8631 from Dell with CD21 firmware from the Dell web site. No problems @ all. Using Bitsetting with Benq Boot Type Managment Tool.
At this time i dont have to flash my drive to Benq FW.

so far
Dragon