-- Results and Conclusions
-- Page: 1 2
3 We used our test rig to
run a few benches on this drive, it consists of:
- AMD XP 2000+ CPU
- Epox 8K7A+ Motherboard
- BuffaloTech 512MB DDR
The drive was set to DMA mode to maximize
performance and speed. Our tests will basically utilize Nero's
suite of
optical drive tools,
Sisoft Sandra
and 3 burn tests with an average score calculated for CD-R and CD-RW
media. The benchmark tests are free to download and are also
included with the Nero software bundle. You may try them out
to test out your own system for comparison.
We first ran the CDSpeed utility to get a general
idea of the read and write speeds. We used a 17 track audio
CD:
Click above to enlarge
The average read speed was a
respectable 35.31X, with an end speed of 46.42X. The seek
times did not change much, but the CPU utilization was a bit high at
the low and high speed marks. Initial DAE (digital audio
extraction) test yielded a 10.
The next test checked the DAE speeds of
the drive using CD DAE from Nero.
I actually expected a higher extraction
speed than 33.4X. Not a major issue as it still finished a tad
over 4 minutes.
Here is the Sisoft Sandra CD/DVD
Benchmark:
Our burn test are averaged over 3 tries
on the same media using the same 605MB iso rip of NBA Live 2003.
The CD-R test was conducted using the Kodak Ultima and Fuji (Tayo
Yuidens).
The Kodak Ultima completed the burn
process at 2 minutes and 44 seconds. The Fuji was able to
finish on an average of 2 minutes and 42 seconds. Speeds
seemed to top off once you get closer to the actual 52X rating.
The only CD-RW discs I had were rated at 10X.
These averaged a 7 minute and 41 second burn time.
Without faster CD-RW media, we can't exactly say this is the fastest
we've encountered.
The DVD abilities were tested with
PowerDVD. Since the drive utilizes Samsung's sound dampening
technology, there wasn't much noise inteference heard.
Overall, the drive is an excellent value
as usual. We have been using this drive for the past 3 weeks,
zero coasters so far. The Super Link (Just Link) option was
remarkable, considering I was transferring data over the network while
it was in operation.
The one and only downside that still
plagues this model family is the inability to alter burn speeds.
If this can be fixed in a firmware upgrade, many people will be quite
content.
Pros:
- Super Link/Just Link technology to prevent buffer-underuns
- Very quiet drive
- Mt. Rainier support
- Nero and PowerDVD software included
Cons:
- Although default speeds have been raised, Just Speed
STILL can not be disabled!
- No blank CDR / CD-RW discs included
|
 |
|
