which is best - Plextor PX-716UF or Sony 710 UL????? ok both are about $200 online. if you had the choice between the two, what would you recommend?? thanks for all of your help. thanks!
No doubt in my mind. Take the Plextor. They are rock solid, and Plextor provides firmware updates. Sony doesn't have much interest in providing firmware updates on some, maybe most, models.
thanks guys - i got the Plextor PX-716UF. its awesome. its fast and its quiet and it had a firmware update to provide 6x DL support. one happy camper am i!
I have two Sony DRU-710A's (and one DRU-510A no longer in use). They both work very well and have gotten good reviews online. They also produce backups that work on all five of my Sony standalone players and a few odd brands I own. Sony has firmware updates on all of their retail DVD drives (at least 19 styles) and their support site makes it easy to download and install the updates. I just bought a Plextor 716 (still in box), but may return it for the new Memorex 16x16 (releasing this month) or the new Sony DRU-720A. I saw some people having problems with the Plextor 716 on different forums. They mentioned Nero not recognizing the drive and several other issues. Something about it being very picky about being the Master drive?? I not an expert so these guys may have better input, but I have been burning DVDs for two years. I have backed up my 200 and 600 DVD jukeboxes, plus about 200 more TV series and miscellaneous DVDs I own. Hope that helps... Sony Vaio VGC-RA710G/3.4 GHz/512 ram XP Media Center Edition Sony DRU-710A Burner Memorex 8x, Verbatim 8x, Sony 8x, Memorex 4xRW
DVD burners should always be set to Master since they require all the resources and bandwidth they can get for top performance. Blaming any particular make/model drive for having issues when set to Slave is just plain silly to me.
So you would not recommend two burners in one PC? My LG DVD-ROM that came with my Sony Vaio is crapping out. I wanted to replace it with another faster burner. My Sony DRU-700A is good, but the DL speed is slow. I could make the new drive the master and the 700A the slave. I like having two drives so I can burn without babysitting the PC. I can't see spending money on another DVD-ROM drive, when I can get a better burner...
You can certainly have two burners but it can be a problem having them both on the same IDE especially when doing on the fly burning. To my way of thinking unless you're planning on burning two discs simultaneously there's no need for two burners. There are definite benefits to having a ROM for your ripping chores since they're obviously much cheaper as well as being able to rip at higher speeds than a stock burner without needing a hacked firmware. You can still do your burning without babysitting - put the original in the ROM, blank in the burner and off you go
Yeah - that's what I do now with my LG DVD-ROM and my Sony burner. I want to get a faster burner - so I'd have to get a new ROM drive and a new burner. What's a really good/cheap ROM only drive?
I think the Lite On 167T is the best you can get. It's fast, accurate and a bargain at $25-$30. Mine tears through everything I've stuffed in it including some pretty scuffed up DVDs
My vote would go for the new Plextor,I am still using a PX-712 that will read anything I throw at it and it's fast.
Thanks for the advice and information. I'm a little ignorant in some areas. How can I have them on separate IDE's? I know there is a primary and secondary and each has a device 0 and device 1. I know to go there and turn off DMA when flashing firmware - but that's the end of my knowledge... Currently my primary has device 0 at Ultra DMA 5. My secondary has device 0 and 1 both at Ultra DMA 2.
Basically seperate IDE's means one drive on the Primary IDE cable and the other on the Secondary IDE cable
