Hello and I hope I'm posting this in the right place! I wasn't sure what I wanted to say, so I have spent a while typing it out in 'Word' and am going to paste it here. Here is my problem. I recently had a thread going about DVD+R Verbatim AZO and I was completely reassured that these were excellent discs for creating back-ups, however, they would not work on my drive, which is – Atapi DVD DD 2x16x4x16 firmware version G7V9. This was eventually identified as a re-badged Benq DW1620 By the way I tried these discs at various speeds, 2.4x 4x 8x 12x and even 16x because the writer said it could handle them. I then tried my TDK 8x DVD+R media code 002 and of course it worked perfectly. I have always used these discs with huge success. Now here’s the next problem. I need some more discs, but my electronic store doesn’t stock them any more. I have looked elsewhere but can’t seem to find any. So, maybe I’m now thinking that its about time I bought a new DVD writer because, as I understand it 8x discs are going to be increasingly harder to get hold of. I know some stores sell their own branded ones, sometimes at ridiculous cheap prices but I don’t really want to go there. Question, I have been looking on the net and can see that writers are now considerably cheaper than when I first bought mine, so, without starting a “mines better than yours” slanging match, can someone steer me in the right direction for a decent writer at a decent price? For example, the first one I looked at, at PC world was a Sony DWG 120A at £30 (approx. $62) don’t forget that stuff is more expensive here in the UK But, before I go that far I have been reading up about Benq and apparently although my firmware is G7V9 this is bulk firmware. There is a different firmware for retail. What’s the difference? I hope that all this makes sense and I am looking forward to your masterly comments, observations and recommendations. Many thanks, in advance. Baz P.S. I have looked at other threads on this, but as I have multiple questions, I hope you don't mind me starting another one. Also its Sunday and She, who must be obeyed will not want me staying on here much longer, so I'll probably get back tomorrow. Again, thanks.
That's actually the retail drive,also known as rebadge. The B7V9 is the bulk firmware version. It can be cross flashed to B7V9 firmware,but you'll have to use the BQ flasher utility for this. I'm not sure how you do it,but you should be able to find that info here: http://club.cdfreaks.com/forumdisplay.php?f=92 That's the place to go. They do know their stuff when it comes to cross flashing firmware. Got room in that tower for another dvd-rw drive? You can use that older drive as the reader and new burner for the burner. Makes is an easier process and saves all the wear + tear on that new drive from the vigors of ripping. All 4 of my benqs will burn anything I throw at them.1640 is my best burner,but very hard to find. My 1650 is very good.
As for new drives you can purchase new BenQ, Lite-ON, and NEC drives from newegg.com (and most any other online retailer) for $30-$38. I have never personally used a Lite-On or NEC drive but have heard that their very reliable.
Hmm, I've heard about cross flashing on another forum for Personal Video Recorders. Thats buying a cheaper model and flashing it with software for the more expensive model, Have I got that right? I don't really want to go down that road. The thing is, if I buy a newer DVD Burner, will I then be able to burn 16x media? which I can't do at the moment. I think that media is going to be my problem. A good idea that, about placing another burner in the same tower, although time is not an issue, as I'm disabled and don't work. I do have a newer, go faster computer that only has a CD writer and I'm wondering that if I do get a new burner, about putting it in there. I have also seen a Benq DW1650 for £33. Bearing in mind about cost of stuff in the UK. My existing burner cost £60 about 16-18 months ago. But I did see somewhere on one of these threads that that could be a rebadged Pioneer or something like that. I suppose basically that now that 16x medium like the Verbatim are going to be more widely available and reasonably priced, What burners should I be looking at? Having just said that, I don't necessarily want the most expensive. Just because it cost more doesn't mean it's the best!
Most of the crossflashing I've seen is on pc dvd-rw drives. Example: Phillips 8631 which is another re-badged benq 1620,with the G7V9 firmware. Lots of peeps have flashed that firmware to the actual Benq 1620's B7V9 fw. I'm not sure what the real difference is other than being re-badges.There is some risk for this.There can also be some bad drives out there.That can occur with any brand name dvd-rw drive. Sometimes it may be the chip setting,which Benq uses Phillips chip sets on the 1620/1640/1650/and 1655. Here in the USA,benqs are one of the cheapest drives. There should be some other sites in the UK to find them cheaper. NEC/Lite-on/LG/Pioneer are some other quality drives. Plextors are said to be the best,but cost a lot more money,and they are even using re-badged benqs on their economy drives-but still cost more than Benqs.These benqs will perform better than most of those $100+ dvd-rw drives out there.Very cheap here. I've burned a ton of +16x/-16x verbatim/ +16x Ritek-P16/+16x Ricohjpn-r03/Ty-G03/and even 16x cmags and 16x prodisc. All burned ok,but the cmags and prodiscs had a lot worse scans. I average about 1 burn coaster out of 400+ burns on all my Q's.They also favor plus format,and will booktype them to dvd-rom for phenomenal stand alone compatability. Faster pc with cd-rw drive? You could slap a dvd-rw drive in there. I got 4 pcs. 3 have dual drives-with dvd-rom and dvdrw or dual dvd-rw drives,and an old 598 mhz celeron with single drive. That old celeron puts out some very nice backups,but slower when using dvd shrink. Faster PC = Faster backup process time. Cd-rw drives: These can always be swapped out for a dvd-rw drive.They'll do both cd and dvd burning.Maybe not burn a cd as fast as a cd-rw drive.
Yes, I get your drift. My old PC has a P3 733mh and when I burn, it book types to DVD-rom, as you say and is quite stable. Using DVDShrink the drop in quality is barely noticeable. I use either comp. for CD writing, the old one takes 10-12 minutes using Real Player, but the new comp with a P4 2.8mh Celeron takes between 5-7 minutes, but as I said, time is not really a problem. The main problem seems to be that:- (1) My old burner will not burn 16x media, and (2) that we are not going to be able to get 8x quality discs for much longer. I gather its the same problem in the U.S.A. My local store has been selling Verbs 16x for £29 a 100 and when I looked in last Saturday, they also had TDK and Maxell 16x. They did have 8x TDK but they were -r, and I found out early on that the burner wouldn't accept that type of disc. With regards to the cross flashing, I don't fancy that much, especially as you say that there could be some risks. I did have a look at the other site, but it seems too technical for me. I've also had a look at newegg.com and needless to say, their prices are phenomenal. I wonder if they export to the UK! Even the Verbs are half the price they are here. Lokk's like I'm going to have to upgrade sooner or later. I'll try some browsing for better prices.
8x media: Unless it's full hub inkjet printable verbatim and maxell,all the good 8x media is extinct.MCC-003 verbatim/Maxell-02/ and Yuden000-T02 sony regular +8x, gone.Also the +8x Office Depot Ritek-R03's are gone. Even ordering Ty on the web site here in the USA,they may say 8x,but most likely send you 16x. It's the manufacturers way of saying it's time to upgrade. That's what I like about genuine benq drives.BenQ keeps on top of those firmware updates to handle the newer/faster media. Some brand names have very few,if any update the fw after they build a drive.
You say that Benq keeps on top of firmware updates, which is interesting, because one threads here says that there is a new f/w update for 1650 and another thread says that Benq are withdrawing from the European market! Oh dear, I'm confused!. I did some searching yesterday but couldn't find a cheap 1650 but did locate a Pioneer DVR 111 for £25 (about U.S. $47) and a Plextor RTL PX-750A/T3 for £45. Will these drives handle 16x media? I also located some TDK 8x, so I might just go with them for now. I suspect I will have to upgrade eventually. But it's going to be interesting to see what's going to happen in the future with Blu-Ray and HDD DD. The movie companies are not going to be selling their films on this type of disc - whoever wins out - are they? On a different note, I'm not really bothered about printable media, although in the early days I did used to stick printable labels on the disc and then wonder why they wouldn't play on the stand alone player. You learn by yor mistakes, right. Quite fun though, soaking all those discs in warm soapy water and peeling the labels off again. Edit:- Just noticed that my Norton has blocked a Trojan. I'm going to try and find out where from and do some kicking. I got a result once before.
