X-bit labs

LiteOn SOHW-1213S Dual DVD±RW Recorder Review (page 4)

Category: Storage

by Vasily Melnik

[ 10/08/2004 | 12:04 PM ]

We’ve finished with the burn time, let’s check the quality of this same burning. We’ll see below how well the SOHW-1213S handles CD-R discs.

  
C1/C2 error count and Beta/Jitter graphs for the CD-R written at 48x

It’s nice we have no C2 errors, not to mention CU ones, on the disc. There are rather high peaks of C1 errors at the beginning and end of the disc, but they are still acceptable and rather small in extent. As for the Beta and Jitter parameters, the former starts fluctuating since the 50-th minute, and the latter – since the 30-th. The closer the end of the disc, the greater the deviations are. But as we saw in the read graph, the drive has no problems reading this disc, save for a single area where it slows down. Now let’s examine the quality of the disc written at a lower speed.

  
C1/C2 error count and Beta/Jitter graphs for the CD-R written at 24x

There’s still a surge of C1 errors at the beginning of the disc. Peaks of C1 errors are higher than they were on the disc written at 48x speed, but remain in the acceptable range. On the other hand, the level of C1 errors is not increasing at the end of the disc. The total of first encoder errors has decreased after I’ve switched to 24x, but not too much: from 34,042 to 33,857. There are still no second encoder errors. As for the Beta/Jitter parameters, the graphs are normal at 24x speed. While there are still minor Beta fluctuations at the end of the disc, Jitter is within the norm throughout the entire CD-R. The overall quality of the written disc has got better at the smaller burn speed, but not much. What if we drop the burn speed to 16x?

  
C1/C2 error count and Beta/Jitter graphs for the CD-R written at 16x

Again, there’re numerous C1 errors at the beginning of the disc, but their peak values are smaller. In comparison to 24x speed, there’s no increase of C1 errors at the end of the disc. The total of first encoder errors has diminished again, although by a small degree – from 33,857 to 32,279. There is a single surge of C2 errors at the end of the disc. Their amount doesn’t allow speaking about any problems with the written medium. Most probably they are due to some minor defect on the surface of the blank I used. The Beta/Jitter parameters are also within the norm, with only minor fluctuations present. Overall, there’s again a certain improvement of the burn quality, but we might have hoped for something much better from switching to 16x burn speed.

All in all, it seems like you profit little by choosing a lower CD-R burn speed with the Lite-On SOHW-1213S. To voice my final verdict, however, I will use the CD CATS SA3 system first.