Best CD Burners and Error Checking Software

[GuitarRuss]

The Plextor 760 and 755 seem to be unavailable. What a strange company - they make the #1 rated drive by CDfreaks and then pull the product...weird.

So I need to buy a higher quality burner because it makes me nervous using the one that I've got, not that it's shown any problems, but just for peace of mind. What are the top drives available for burning master cds besides the plextors?

Also, what are good programs for checking to see if your master cd is high enough quality?

Thanks in advance.

[jamesp]

The Plextor software is the only officially supported software available unless you are prepared to pay for something like a Clover or Stagetech system. I understand that there are still a few 755 drives around if you look very carefully. The reason for Plextor discontinuing these drives was out of Plextor's control and involved a complex relationship between a number of different optical drive manufacturers.

If you are prepared to use non-supported software then Lite-On drives are supported by their K-probe software and Nero's CDSpeed will also show error information for certain drives (but I'm not sure which ones).

Cheers

James.

[Lagerfeldt]

LaCie - d2 DVD±RW with LightScribe - FireWire, Double Layer and Toast® 7 Titanium for Mac

That's an excellent burner.

However, there's no software bundled to check for errors like the Plextor software.

[GuitarRuss]

Originally Posted by Lagerfeldt

LaCie - d2 DVD±RW with LightScribe - FireWire, Double Layer and Toast® 7 Titanium for Mac

That's an excellent burner.

However, there's no software bundled to check for errors like the Plextor software.

That looks like a great option for Mac. I'm on a PC so I'll need a different one.
I looked all over, for the Plextor's could only find used and refurbished. I don't find that appealing, it would make me nervous.

CD freaks recommends BenQ DW1655, BenQ DW1650, and Lite-On LH-20A1H as being the best burners (in addition to the Plextor 755 and 760) although they have a bunch of criteria like speed and overburning that they get excited about, that means nothing to me. Although, usually the ones that are good for going over spec, outperform others on regular duties.

[Lagerfeldt]

Originally Posted by GuitarRuss

That looks like a great option for Mac. I'm on a PC so I'll need a different one.

Oh, I'm sorry to hear that. ;-)

In that case you need this version, this is one of the best external burners IMO
LaCie - LaCie d2 DVD±RW with LightScribe - USB 2.0 and FireWire, with Double Layer

[GuitarRuss]

Originally Posted by Lagerfeldt

Oh, I'm sorry to hear that. ;-)

In that case you need this version, this is one of the best external burners IMO
LaCie - LaCie d2 DVD±RW with LightScribe - USB 2.0 and FireWire, with Double Layer

Smartass! lol

Thanks, I'll check that out. I always appreciate your helpful and informative posts.

I just read a whole bunch of reviews and found something very interesting information. The BenQ drives are out for me because they don't support C2 error detection but the Plextors and LiteOn's.

Here's the link to the full review: CDRLabs.com - Lite-On LH-20A1H 20x Super AllWrite DVD±RW/RAM - Reviews

However the Liteon LH-20A1H does have error detection capability. It had far fewer C1 errors than the Plextor 755 even when burning at a higher speed!

Also, it far outperformed the Plextor for accurately reading a scratched cd. So even if you have a Plextor for burning, one of these would complement it well for reducing read errors on the way in. It slowed down to make sure it got the data right, while other drives were faster but had more errors.

CD DAE................. Avg. Speed ........Errors ........% of Disc

Lite-On LH-20A1H ..3.0x ..................1829477...........0.23%

LG GSA-H22N......... 14.4x................. 111630297..... 14.25%

Samsung SH-S182D. 28.9x................ 2099160......... 0.27%

Plextor PX-760A...... 23.2x................ 73854517....... 9.60%



The Liteon rates well with errors. In this test it had no C2 errors and low C1 errors despite being burned at 32X.



Here is a test done earlier on the Plextor 755. It actually shows more C1 errors!!! The Liteon 20H shows 770 C1 errors at a 32X burn, while the Plextor 755 shows 1823 at a slower 24X burn! The LiteOn LTR had the least errors at 24X.

To test the PX-755UF's writing quality I used the Q-Check C1/C2 Test built into PlexTools Professional. This test can be used to give us the average, maximum and total number of C1, C2 and CU (uncorrectable) errors on a disc. For these tests, the drive's read speed has been set to 24x. For comparison, I've also included test results from Lite-On IT's KProbe2.

Fuji 48x (Taiyo Yuden)

Ave Max Total C1 0.4 15.0 1823 C2 0 0 0 CU 0 0 0
Lite-On LTR-52246S - KProbe
This is taken from this page: CDRLabs.com - Plextor PX-755UF 16x FireWire/USB 2.0 DVD±RW - Reviews

So the Liteon LH-20a1h had less C1 errors despite being burned at 32X as opposed to the 24X that the Plextor 755 was. The error rate is even lower on the LiteOn LTR-52246S but that test was done at 24X too, so it would be interesting to see them go head to head.

If anyone else has more data to add that would be great. Unless someone can show similar tests that point to the Plextors being more accurate, I would say these LiteOn drives are the ones to beat as far as reducing C1 errors and avoiding reading errors.

[GuitarRuss]

So the Lacie D2 has 3368 C1 errors when burning at 32X so the LiteOn LH-20 outperforms it in terms of accuracy. Also, the LiteOn did way better at avoiding reading damaged data from a disk. I would think this is important because you're receiving data disks burnt from all sorts of systems that could have errors.

The full review is here:CDRLabs.com - LaCie 16x d2 DVD±RW - Reviews

[GuitarRuss]

Here's the real kicker - The LiteOn 20A1H has lower errors, better read accuracy and it costs less than $40 US!!!

[rehepapp]

Plextor Premium 2 with AMQ (Audio Master Quality) is still available.
eBay: PLEXTOR-PX-PREMIUM-2/SW- 52X32X52 CDRW DRIVE NEW (item 180131012797 end time Jul-15-07 17:32:19 PDT)

[Lagerfeldt]

Originally Posted by GuitarRuss

...Also, the LiteOn did way better at avoiding reading damaged data from a disk. I would think this is important because you're receiving data disks burnt from all sorts of systems that could have errors.

The full review is here:CDRLabs.com - LaCie 16x d2 DVD±RW - Reviews

Thanks for the link. Based on the PC driver and old firmware (this is the 16x version, not the 18x). I only have Macs here, and the new firmware was implemented from the start AFAIK.

I'm mostly interested in burning with this drive, not reading, but obviously you need to find the best all-round choice that fits your needs.

[GuitarRuss]

Originally Posted by Lagerfeldt

Thanks for the link. Based on the PC driver and old firmware (this is the 16x version, not the 18x). I only have Macs here, and the new firmware was implemented from the start AFAIK.

I'm mostly interested in burning with this drive, not reading, but obviously you need to find the best all-round choice that fits your needs.

Perhaps the newer firmware does lower those errors. I wouldn't be surprised at all if the Mac drivers are better as it is a company that sells primarily to Mac users.

[Lagerfeldt]

Perhaps, I dunno.. anyway, let us know what you end up buying and if it worked out like you hoped.

[GuitarRuss]

I just got it today - I got the 20A1P which is different from the 20A1H. The difference is the A1P doesn't have lightscribe. Lightscribe is for burning a silkscreen type image onto the top of the cd. While a cool feature, my experience with electronics has been, the less moving parts the better because there is less to go wrong. Other than this the two drives are identical.

I still need to get cd checking software. I would guess the PlexTools would be a top contender as it has Q-check which detects C1 and C2 errors. After I get that together and install it, I'll get back to you guys with a report. We'll see if the error levels really are that low.

[Nordenstam]

[lite-on reader vs plextor]

Originally Posted by GuitarRuss

Also, it far outperformed the Plextor for accurately reading a scratched cd. So even if you have a Plextor for burning, one of these would complement it well for reducing read errors on the way in. It slowed down to make sure it got the data right, while other drives were faster but had more errors.

Seems the testers didn't tweak the plextools setup. There's options to make the reading slow down and re-read the offending area until valid data can be produced.

Haven't read the review closely, but it seems all those tests where done at too high speed for the plextor to be happy. If you get a plextor and can compare the lite-on, it would be useful to know what you found at lower speeds.

[GuitarRuss]

Originally Posted by Lupo

[lite-on reader vs plextor]



Seems the testers didn't tweak the plextools setup. There's options to make the reading slow down and re-read the offending area until valid data can be produced.

Haven't read the review closely, but it seems all those tests where done at too high speed for the plextor to be happy. If you get a plextor and can compare the lite-on, it would be useful to know what you found at lower speeds.

That's the general problems with all these reviews and tests they are geared to speed freaks. However, if a burner can score that low in C1 errors at a speed over 28X, it too should have even lower error ratings at a slower speed. I'm not going to get a Plextor just to compare. However, people with Plextors have the QCheck software so if they are able to let people know their accuracy ratings as far as C2 and C1 errors and people with Liteon do the same, it will give people an idea. The Liteon is the fastest burner in the world right now, so the technology is pretty advanced. I would guess they have had to increase accuracy dramatically to get the speeds up that high. A side benefit is that is might make the best burner for slower speed audio accuracy. I don't think they give a crap about the market share of pro-audio, it's not even a real slice of their pie.

I'll let you guys know how mine performs next week when I get the software. Hopefully it performs even better doing slow speed burns than in the high-speed test burns in the review. That would be a nice break - the best product costing such a low price, it seems almost too good to be true. We'll see.

[GuitarRuss]

Seems the testers didn't tweak the plextools setup. There's options to make the reading slow down and re-read the offending area until valid data can be produced.

Plextools is software which can be used with any drive. They use the QCheck software to test the C1 and C2 errors, the fact that these people who are obsessed with burners use this software in testing shows how good it is. If the LiteOn walks all over the Plextor in terms of reading accuracy at high speed, I would bet it does the same at low speed too. I could be wrong, but I think it unlikely. It would be great if they did do a test to see which drive takes the least amount of time to get 100% accuracy. Only someone with both drives can do that test. At $40, it'd be a lot cheaper for one of you guys to get a LiteOn as a second drive than for me to get a Plextor - and then get back to us on a slow speed test comparison.

[jamesp]

The first thing that I would point out is that they used two different pieces of software on two different drives to do the check so there's no way that you can compare those results.

Secondly, as has already been pointed out, the LiteOn drive was struggling to read the disc as it should have been working at a higher speed than 3X. Plextools has a number of advanced options to improve reading accuracy on bad discs but these are disabled by default. If you were to really test like for like you would find that the results are much closer.

Thirdly - you can only use Plextools if you have a Plextor drive. Yes, you can use the basic read functions on any drive but the advanced testing and the write functions only work with Plextor drives. If you are using Plextools Pro without owning a Plextor drive then you must be using pirated software although I believe that the LE and XL versions can be legally obtained without buying a Plextor drive.

Cheers

James.

[GuitarRuss]

Originally Posted by jamesp

The first thing that I would point out is that they used two different pieces of software on two different drives to do the check so there's no way that you can compare those results.

Secondly, as has already been pointed out, the LiteOn drive was struggling to read the disc as it should have been working at a higher speed than 3X. Plextools has a number of advanced options to improve reading accuracy on bad discs but these are disabled by default. If you were to really test like for like you would find that the results are much closer.

Thirdly - you can only use Plextools if you have a Plextor drive. Yes, you can use the basic read functions on any drive but the advanced testing and the write functions only work with Plextor drives. If you are using Plextools Pro without owning a Plextor drive then you must be using pirated software although I believe that the LE and XL versions can be legally obtained without buying a Plextor drive.

Cheers

James.

Are you sure Plextools only works with plextor drives? I haven't had the time to check out or buy the software. I based my assumption on the fact that QCheck from the Plextools was used on all the drives tested to check for C1 and C2 errors. But of course, these are CD freaks, probably capable of modding the software themselves.

If Plextools does in fact only work with Plextor drives, then that might be a good reason to go with them, even if their drive underperforms compared to another one. Can anyone confirm that the software only works with their drives?

[GuitarRuss]

Did some reading, for LiteOn you get KProbe software bundled with some Nero stuff. You have a disk quality check available through Nero which shows C1, C2 and other types of errors. The CDFreaks review said this part of was reliable and performed the tests. reliably.Lite-On LH-20A1S DVD Burner Mini Review on CD Freaks.com - Reviews- Features

What are the features of Plextools that are useful for burning or analyzing high quality masters? I would like to see if KProbe has something equivalent.

[jamesp]

Originally Posted by GuitarRuss

Are you sure Plextools only works with plextor drives? I haven't had the time to check out or buy the software. I based my assumption on the fact that QCheck from the Plextools was used on all the drives tested to check for C1 and C2 errors. But of course, these are CD freaks, probably capable of modding the software themselves.

If you read the reviews carefully you will notice that they are using Plextor drives to actually run the Plextools tests. As I said earlier, Plextools is the only officially supported error checking program that you can obtain for reasonable money. Unfortunately it is only supported by certain older Plextor drives. K-Probe is an unofficial tool written by someone in LiteOn's service department and isn't included with Nero. You are probably thinking of a similar tool called Nero Drivespeed but it is not supported by the drive manufacturers so there is no guarantee that it is accurate.

Plextools is intended to produce full disc reports that include disc layout, error rates and jitter information. In fact, you can run a sequence of up to 4 tests before burning and 6 afterwards so you could repeatedly test a disc for errors if you want to. You can also verify that the data on your disc matches the source data - this feature is included in a number of programs when burning data discs but I know of no other program that includes this feature for audio discs. You can set Plextools up to run these tests automatically whenever you burn a master disc that requires proper documentation.

Another useful feature is that you can run these tests on discs that have already been burned - either in Plextools or in another program. Just this week this feature caught some problems with a particular disc that I had burned in Feurio.

If you get the impression that I'm a Plextools fan then you would probably be right - although some of that may be down to the fact that I was involved in beta testing it up until last year.

Cheers

James.

[GuitarRuss]

It's a shame that Plextools doesn't open themselves to being used with other drives - they would probably make more money that way. My Lite-On is doing quite well with C1 errors not quite low as the tests - but then again I haven't downloaded the latest driver and transfered it to my music computer. I'm sure there are some tweaks that could be done to optimize burning. My error rates are around 1600-2200 using the Nero CD/DVD-Speed utility for C1 errors on disks burnt at 16X. No C2 errors. I also use the verify written data function in Nero but I'm not sure if that's so great. None of the Nero utilities show jitter information for my drive though.

Although it's not Plextools, I think CD/DVD-Speed and Exact Audio Copy do all the important functions that you get with Plextools. If there is something I'm missing that I should be checking, let me know.

I'm really annoyed with Nero 7 because it isn't letting me burn less than 16X on my Taiyo Yuden Cd's. One of the utilities confirmed that these go as low as 4X but it doesn't give me that option. It seems there is this assumption that you are in a hurry when it comes to burning. Is there a better burning program for Audio disks than Nero?

[jamesp]

Originally Posted by GuitarRuss

Is there a better burning program for Audio disks than Nero?

Nero will work but you have to be extremely careful with all the options - it is very easy to produce a CD with gaps between the tracks when you really wanted them to flow together. It might be worth investigating EAC's burning functions or also taking a look at Feurio.

Does Nero's verify function work for audio discs nowadays? It used to only work for data discs.

Cheers

James.

[Julien Apruzzese]

Originally Posted by Lagerfeldt

Oh, I'm sorry to hear that. ;-)

In that case you need this version, this is one of the best external burners IMO
LaCie - LaCie d2 DVD±RW with LightScribe - USB 2.0 and FireWire, with Double Layer

Hi,
i have a LaCie d2 DVD±RW with LightScribe, connected to my Mac G5 by firewire with Mac OS X 10.4.8. I use Taiyo Yuden CD-R to burn audio CD with Toast Titanium 6. All is fine but i am not able to burn a CD at x1 speed. My Toast just proposes me x8, x16, x32, x48. The x1 speed is in gray : you can select it but the effective speed will be x8.
What does it mean ?
Thanks for the support.
Regards.

[cjogo]

Masterlink---don't know what Alesis chose for a burner ..but works perfectly > day in day out

[Lagerfeldt]

Originally Posted by Julien Apruzzese

Hi,
i have a LaCie d2 DVD±RW with LightScribe, connected to my Mac G5 by firewire with Mac OS X 10.4.8. I use Taiyo Yuden CD-R to burn audio CD with Toast Titanium 6. All is fine but i am not able to burn a CD at x1 speed. My Toast just proposes me x8, x16, x32, x48. The x1 speed is in gray : you can select it but the effective speed will be x8.
What does it mean ?
Thanks for the support.
Regards.

You need to match the particular cd with the burn speed, it isn't necessarily a good idea to burn at 1x speed using cd's of today.

You're most likely already getting the best results from 8x as 1x would sustain the laser for too long on that cd.

The limitation is caused by either the burner or the system/driver. Same here, and no worries.

[sergio_fucchi]

I have not read none of You tells about Yamaha CRW-F1 that I (and more people) consider the best to master a CD-Audio.



Sergio.

[Jerry Tubb]

Originally Posted by sergio_fucchi

I have not read none of You tells about Yamaha CRW-F1 that I (and more people) consider the best to master a CD-Audio.

Yes !

We have probably gone through 6 Yamaha F1s over the last few years... they wear out.

iirc Yamaha has stopped building CD burners, so we switched to Plextor 716s about 2-3 years ago.

fwiw - also went thru a half dozen Yamaha CD-R_100 scsi burners a decade before that.

We burn lots of masters and refs : - )

JT

[illynoise]

Pioneer has been the best so far every liteon that I've bought has not lasted more than 6 months.

I only check with nero cd/dvd tools and I haven't had a master sent back to me for C2 errors yet, but I'm sure that there are better options. I've done about 25 cd masters with the pioneer with absolutely no problems. I can't remember exactly what the model number was so I'll look tonight when I get to the studio!

EDIT (I just looked and it's a DVD-111)

[GuitarRuss]

Originally Posted by illynoise

Pioneer has been the best so far every liteon that I've bought has not lasted more than 6 months.

I only check with nero cd/dvd tools and I haven't had a master sent back to me for C2 errors yet, but I'm sure that there are better options. I've done about 25 cd masters with the pioneer with absolutely no problems. I can't remember exactly what the model number was so I'll look tonight when I get to the studio!

Use Nero's CD/DVD-Speed - it's bundled with Nero and it will tell you how many C2 errors and C1 errors and other information if your drive supports that. Also you can use the verify the written data during normal funtion. Also there is a program called "Exact Audio Copy" that some people swear by. CD/DVD Speed has been enough for me but then again I'm not sending CD's off for massive runs either. In that case I'd probably like a double check.

[Coyoteous]

Originally Posted by illynoise

Pioneer has been the best so far every liteon that I've bought has not lasted more than 6 months.

I only check with nero cd/dvd tools and I haven't had a master sent back to me for C2 errors yet, but I'm sure that there are better options. I've done about 25 cd masters with the pioneer with absolutely no problems. I can't remember exactly what the model number was so I'll look tonight when I get to the studio!

- well, that's because C2's (E22's) are fine. E32's, or what you guys like to call CU's, are what cause CD/CD-R part rejection (that and over 100 possible format issues).