MSI or NEC DVD-RW?

subway_ie

I'm looking to buy a new DVD-RW, probably from Komplett. There's 3 that I've been looking at: MSI DR4-A IDE , MSI DR8-A2 IDE and NEC ND-2500 . Not much info on the Komplett site about any of them. What do you think is best, taking price into consideration (€90.75, €112.53 and €107.69)?

K!LL!@N

I'm in the market for one as well.
But i'll be steering clear of MSI.
Has nothing but trouble with cd-rw i've gotten from them.
So i won't be risking hassle for something more expensive.

What about the plextor 708?
It's down to under €150 now.
That's probably what i'm going to get.

Killian

subway_ie

Well, there's a big jump between €90-€110 and €150 - I just can't stretch that far. I'm not looking for cutting edge performance or anything, just reliability and ease of use. I barely ever use my CD-RW, but I'm building a new system and I don't want to go putting in another CD-RW, only to take it out in a few months time for a DVD-RW. I'm leaning towards the NEC, seems to be the popular choice?

K!LL!@N

Well actually the OEM version of the plextor is around €135.
But yeah i think NEC is probably most popular.
For the price.

Killian

Ellesmere

yeah, go for it. i have a NEC dvd-rw over a year and a half and am happy with it. i had a few teething problems on set up (but its rare not to on installing new hard ware) found it wouldn't work with certain software but that was stuff i had for years. works good with Nero. for awhile i couldn't get the cd-r capability working on it and ended up flashing the firmware, works grand now.

sirlinux

The NEC 2100a & 2500 can be made dual layer with a firmware upgrade making it a bargain, see:

http://slashdot.org/articles/04/05/18/038248.shtml?tid=137&tid=164&tid=185&tid=198

Mutant_Fruit

The NEC 2500A burns Dual layer DVD+R's perfectly at 2.4x. And since it is dirt cheap (under 90euro) its well worth buying.

It is in the top 3 drives when it comes to DVD burn quality. It can make great burns on even the cheapest of media, and so far i have had no coasters on 25 DVD's.

The only downside is that it isn't a great DVD reader. Its a bit slow, and can be picky at times. But for burning, you can't buy better.

subway_ie

Originally posted by Mutant_Fruit
The NEC 2500A burns Dual layer DVD+R's perfectly at 2.4x. And since it is dirt cheap (under 90euro) its well worth buying.

€90 from Jes-computer, right? I've been hearing of people having problems with them recently with delivery times and RMAs (I think you had a very late delivery?) so I think I'll stick with Komplett. Especially since I can borrow my dad's credit card and "forget" to repay him, while with Jes, I'll have to pay in advance.

I'm getting a seperate DVD-ROM so the DVD playback wont really be an issue.

qBot

Originally posted by Mutant_Fruit
The NEC 2500A burns Dual layer DVD+R's perfectly at 2.4x. And since it is dirt cheap (under 90euro) its well worth buying.

Is there any drive like this that supports dvd-r or even both..

Mutant_Fruit

Erm.. the Nec 2500A is a drive like that. It burns +R and -R at 8x; +RW and -RW at 4x and DVD+R Duallayer at 2.4x (when the right firmware is flashed in).

qBot

oh ok.. .i just thought it did + media..

neokenzo

I thought most DVD-RW burns on all media?

qBot

nope.. u can get drives that support only dvd+ or drives that support only dvd- or u can get ones that support both. Also, some dvd-roms only read one type of format. However most drives these days support both formats. I just wasnt too sure about the nec.

Mutant_Fruit

my 5 year old DVD-Rom plays back +R and -R perfectly. I have yet to get +RW or -RW discs, so i don't know if they work. Compatibility isn't a big issue with computer drives.

qBot

Originally posted by Mutant_Fruit
Compatibility isn't a big issue with computer drives.

Thats not true.. i have had little experience with dvd writable media but enough to know that their is a big compatibility issue. Firstly if u buy a Packard Bell Laptop the dvd writer that comes with it only writes to dvd+r/rw and it doesn't read dvd-r. Also my gateway computer has trouble reading dvd-r's properly. Saying that though dvd-r media is up against 97% compatibile with existing dvd readers. + media languishes down in 87% - source . Plus an xbox containing a samsung dvd drive wont read + media either.

Edit: Correction, it is possible that Packard Bell laptops do read dvd-r's but they most certainly don't write to them. unless of course they now feature a new drive that does.

byte

Originally posted by qBot
Also my gateway computer has trouble reading dvd-r's properly.

I've similar problem. In my case, it's coz the supplied Hitachi DVD-ROM drive doesn't support -R and I couldn't find any firmware to make it do otherwise.

Anyway, I've the NEC2500a and it works fine for me. No coasters yet anyway using Datawrite Reds.

qBot

sweet, ive been holding back getting a dvd-r/+r as i new the dl drives were coming out shortly and were going to be expensive. That NEC seems like a great deal

Mutant_Fruit

Right, for those of you having problems with +R media, there is an easy fix.

If your drive supports bitsetting (which the 2500A does) just set the booktype to DVD-Rom, and your DVD+R(W) will be recognised as a DV-Rom rather than a DVD+R. THat should improve compatibility in a few cases, and won't harm the disc in any way whatsoever.