by Andrey Kuznetcov
02/07/2005 | 12:27 PM
let's take a closer look at this product.
The drive produced by the joint venture Hitachi-LG Data Storage has a memorable appearance due to the exclusive design of the front panel. The manufacturer’s logo and the symbols denoting the class of the device are put on the front of the tray. An eject button and a LED indicator are found under the tray. The bottom part of the front panel is made of violet plastic – yet another distinctive feature of this model. On top of the case there are some pressed-out grooves that add robustness to the device. The traditional set of power and interface connectors, digital and analog audio outputs, plus a jumper for selecting the device’s status on the IDE channel, are located at the drive’s rear panel.
As for the “most-universal-drive” claim, we want to clarify what it means. We’ve got used to DVD±RW drives, but here the manufacturer itself calls the device a DVD-RAM drive, since the LG GSA-4082B is among the few devices available in the market that support almost all media formats – of both DVD and CD varieties. So, here’s a full list: DVD-RAM, DVD+R/RW, DVD-R/RW, DVD-ROM, CD-R/RW, CD-ROM Mode 1,2, CD-DA, CD-I FMV, CD-ROM XA, Mixed CD, CD Extra, CD Text, CD-Plus, Photo CD, Video CD.
The drive offers the following maximum read speeds: 32x CD-ROM and CD-R, 24x CD-RW, 12x DVD-ROM, 8x DVD-R/+R, 8x DVD-R/RW, and 3x DVD-RAM. The max write speeds are as follows: 24x CD-R, 16x CD-RW, 8x DVD+R and DVD-R, 4x DVD+RW and DVD-RW, and 3x DVD-RAM. The drive is equipped with a 2MB buffer. The declared access time is 125 milliseconds for CD-ROM, 145 milliseconds for DVD-ROM, and 165 milliseconds for DVD-RAM media. The drive supports the E-IDE/ATAPI interface and can be placed horizontally as well as vertically. The device’s dimensions are 146 x 184.7 x 41.3 mm; its weight is 920 gram. Among the supported technologies, a buffer underrun protection is listed, of course.
The manufacturer’s recommended retail price is $78.
The second drive from LG reviewed here has the same appearance as the first, so I won’t repeat myself describing its design. After all, we’re more interested in the technical characteristics and the GSA-4160B, being a newer model, has much better operational parameters. The main qualitative difference is the support of dual-layer DVD discs; the speeds have also been improved.
So, the max read speeds of the GSA-4160B are: 40x with CD-ROM and CD-RW media, 16x with DVD-ROM and DVD±R, 8x with DVD±RW, 5x with DVD-RAM, and 8x with DVD+R9. The max burn speeds are: 40x CD-R, 24x CD-RW, 16x DVD+R, 8x DVD-R, 4x DVD±RW, 5x DVD-RAM, and 2.4x DVD+R9. The drive is equipped with a 2MB buffer. The declared access time is 125 milliseconds with CD-ROM, 145 milliseconds with DVD-ROM, and 165 milliseconds with DVD-RAM media. The drive supports the E-IDE/ATAPI interface and can be placed horizontally as well as vertically. The device’s dimensions are 146 x 184.7 x 41.3 mm; its weight is about 900 gram. The following media formats are supported: DVD-ROM, DVD-R, DVD-RW, DVD+R, DVD+RW, DVD+R9, DVD-Video, DVD-RAM, CD-ROM, CD-ROM XA, CD-Audio, CD Extra, CD Text, CD-IReady, CD-Bridge, Photo-CD, VideoCD, Hybrid CD.
The manufacturer’s recommended retail price is $96.
This drive’s features are recognizable, too. Like many other optical drives selling under the Sony brand, this device is a third-party product, namely the SOHW-1633S model from Lite-On. There’s only an eject button with rounded corners and a LED indicator under the tray on the ivory-colored front panel of the drive; a headphones socket is unavailable. The three symbols denote the class of the device. At the rear panel of the drive, there are interface and power connectors, digital and analog audio outputs, and two jumper blocks (one jumper is for factory diagnostics purposes). The device has a “shortened” design, so it can easily fit into smaller system cases.
The max read speeds of the drive are 48x with CD-ROM and 16x with DVD-ROM discs. The drive can perform burning at the following max speeds: 48x CD-R, 24x CD-RW, 16x DVD+R, 8x DVD+R, 2.4x DVD+R9, 4x DVD±RW. The size of the cache buffer is 2MB; the access time is 135 milliseconds with CDs and 140 milliseconds with DVDs. The drive supports the following media formats: DVD single/dual layer, DVD-R ( 3.9 GB / 4.7 GB ), DVD-R multi-borders, DVD+R, DVD+R multi-sessions, DVD-RW, DVD+RW, CD-DA, CD-ROM, CD-ROM / XA, Photo-CD, Multi-session, Karaoke-CD, Video-CD, CD-I FMV, CD Extra, CD Plus, CD-R, CD-RW. The E-IDE/ATAPI interface is supported here. The drive can be positioned either horizontally or vertically.
The dimensions of the device are 145 x 170 x 41.3 mm; its weight is less than 900 grams. Being in fact a product from Lite-On, the Sony DW-D22A drive supports Lite-On’s exclusive technologies: SMART_BURN is a buffer underrun protection technology; SMART-X allows to process CD-DA, VCD and DVD discs at the maximum allowable speed; and VAS reduces the level of noise and vibration. Besides that, this optical drive features the innovation we’ve already met in other products from Sony: by default it works with CD media at a reduced speed. It helps to avoid unnecessary noise and to achieve a better reading of the disc in some cases. The default speed of our sample was 40x, but if you want to have the maximum 48x, you should insert the disc and then press and hold the eject button for a few seconds until the indicator blinks twice. When you load another disc, the speed is reset to default.
The manufacturer’s recommended retail price is $84.
We used the following software to check out the operational characteristics of the drives:
The configuration of the testbed:
The drives were attached to the second IDE channel as “Master”.
The two informational utilities we use in our tests point at the LG GSA-4160B and the Sony DW-D22A as having a wider functionality. The former drive reports its ability to process almost every existing media format, except CD+G. Sony’s drive has a higher speed formula, does not support DVD-RAM, but can process CD+G data. The drives all support the regional protection.
I tested the drives in CD WinBench 99 using a molded CD and two its copies on a CD-R and a CD-RW. Since the Sony DW-D22A can work with CDs in two modes, I will use two speeds (40x and 48x) in CD WinBench 99 and in some Nero CD-DVD Speed tests.
In the screenshots above you can see that the LG GSA-4082B, the slowest model among the tested drives, reads the three test discs without problems. The other drive from LG also draws an almost perfect data-transfer graph. The Sony DW-D22A had problems reading the final stretch of the molded CD and had to reduce its read speed in every mode.
The Sony DW-D22A has got a higher CD WinMark score with every type of the medium. Well, it should obviously be the best at its maximum speed, but we also see its advantage when its performance should roughly equal that of the LG GSA-4160B.
Between the two drives from LG there’s little difference. The formally faster GSA-4160B has even a worse performance score with the CD-RW disc than the GSA-4082B drive. The performance of the Sony DW-D22A with the CD-ROM disc was slower at 48x speed, probably because it stumbled a little at the final portion of the disc. With the CD-RW disc, the CD WinMark scores are practically the same at both speeds; it means the max speed of the Sony drive is no more than 40x with CD-RW media.
As for the other tests, you may note the bigger access time of the Sony DW-D22A in comparison with the LG drives. This difference mostly concerns the CD-ROM disc where the Sony had some problems at reading, though.
To perform the basic tests I took five CD discs: a molded CD enclosed with a computer magazine, 700MB CD-R and CD-RW discs with data written by the test utility itself, a likewise prepared 800MB CD-R, and an Audio CD. I remind you that the Sony DW-D22A was tested in two modes, 40x and 48x.
Model Name | CD-ROM | CD-R | CD-R 800MB | CD-RW | CD-DA |
LG GSA-4082B | Graph | Graph | Graph | Graph | Graph |
LG GSA-4160B | Graph | Graph | Graph | Graph | Graph |
Sony DW-D22A 40x | Graph | Graph | Graph | Graph | Graph |
Sony DW-D22A 48x | Graph | Graph | Graph | Graph | Graph |
The tests don’t bring any surprises. We can note that the maximum speed of the LG GSA-4082B is 24x with CD-RW and CD-DA media. The LG GSA-4160B confirmed the declared maximum of the read speed with all types of discs. The maximum CD-RW read speed of the Sony DW-D22A is limited at 32x. The access time of the Sony drive is almost the same in both of its modes and is overall bigger than with the drives from LG.
The next group of basic tests is about the DVD format. I took five discs to examine the drives’ ability to process the various available formats: a DVD-ROM with a movie and its copies recorded on DVD-R (Digitex), DVD-RW (TDK), DVD+R (Fujifilm), and DVD+RW (Verbatim) discs.
Model Name | DVD-ROM | DVD-R | DVD-RW | DVD+R | DVD+RW |
LG GSA-4082B | Graph | Graph | Graph | Graph | Graph |
LG GSA-4160B | Graph | Graph | Graph | Graph | Graph |
Sony DW-D22A | Graph | Graph | Graph | Graph | Graph |
The Sony DW-D22A doesn’t speed up above 8x in practice, while the pair of LG drives reached their declared speed ceilings of 12x and 16x. The GSA-4160B reads DVD±R media somewhat faster than DVD±RW ones. The access time of the Sony DW-D22A is higher than that of the LG devices.
To determine the drives’ ability to create precise copies of audio discs I performed the Advanced DAE Quality Test. Two special CD-R discs, prepared by the Nero CD-DVD Speed utility itself, were employed to check the hardware characteristics of the devices pertaining to audio extraction. The first disc is normal, but the other has deliberately inflicted scratches on its surface, imitating a long-used CD.
|
|
| |
These three screenshots show you how the drives work with the normal disc. Alas, even in such favorable conditions, the GSA-4082B couldn’t achieve the maximum possible quality score. This is unacceptable, of course. Besides that, this drive has a big offset that also makes it hard to create an accurate audio copy. The GSA-4082B can read three types of housekeeping data out of four. The newer model, the GSA-4160B, has got the highest quality score, working at a much higher speed. The rest of its results are practically the same as with the previous model with the only exception of its ability to copy “on the fly” at 16x. The Sony DW-D22A shows the best performance in this test. Besides the maximum possible quality score, this drive has the smallest offset and reads all four types of housekeeping information.
|
|
| |
Here we deal with a bad, scratched disc. The GSA-4082B finds the changed conditions unfavorable and reduces its quality score and makes errors when copying on the fly. The GSA-4160B performs somewhat better, although its quality score has reduced, too. The GSA-4160B couldn’t perform on the fly copying with the bad disc. The Sony DW-D22A committed a minimum of errors, retaining its 100-percent quality score. It could also perform on-the-fly copying at any speed, so this drive seems to be preferable as concerns making audio copies.
To check out the ability of the drives to process errors occurring during extraction of audio tracks I used the specialized Advanced DAE Error Correction Test with the same bad compact disc prepared by Nero CD-DVD Speed. The test utility determines how many C2 errors should be found by the drive and how many it does find, producing Quality Score and C2 Accuracy parameters which reflect the efficiency of the hardware error correction mechanism of the optical drive.
|
|
| |
Unfortunately, there’re no quality scores in the first two screenshots that belong to the LG drives: they just fell into a permanent coma at the same sections of the disc. Anyway, the screenshots indicate that the drives fail the test as they fail to find quite a number of errors. You can’t hope to get accurate audio copies with such results. The Sony DW-D22A has much better results, almost reaching the best possible result.
I used the Nero CD DAE utility to estimate the speed it took the drives to extract audio tracks from the audio disc I had used earlier and to convert them into files of the WAV format.
| |
| |
The LG GSA-4082B is the worst in this contest, working at the lowest speed and making as many as 254 errors.
The second audio extraction utility, Exact Audio Copy, differs from Nero CD DAE as it is capable of making use of the hardware characteristics of optical drives to achieve the maximum quality of the resulting files. I used the EAC utility to determine the hardware properties of the drives and then to extract audio tracks (in the Secure Mode) from the same disc as in the previous test; the tracks were saved as WAV-files.
To check out the support of C2 errors, a special “bad” audio disc was used, prepared by Nero CD-DVD Speed.
|
|
| |
The program doesn’t find the LG drives capable of caching the data, although this is questionable, recalling the results of Nero CD-DVD Speed. All the drives can process C2 errors and support the Accurate Stream mode.
|
|
| |
The drives all extracted the audio tracks without errors. The GSA-4160B took the least time to do it, while the Sony DW-D22A was the slowest in this test.
I burned DVD+RW and CD-RW discs with the help of Nero Burning ROM. A DVD+RW TDK 4x disc proved to be “inedible” for the GSA-4082B drive, so I had to use a DVD+RW Fujifilm 4x instead. As a CD-RW media, I took a Verbatim DataLifePlus Ultra-Speed 16-24x disc.
Then I wrote a DVD movie from an image file (3.987GB) on the hard drive to the DVD+RW at 4x speed. An MPEG-4 movie file (692M) was copied to the CD-RW at 16x (with the GSA-4082B) and at 24x (with the other two drives).
The Sony DW-D22A has a certain advantage in the DVD burn speed, but loses to the GSA-4160B in the CD-RW burn speed.
Using the CD Quality Check test I checked out the quality of DVD+RW and CD-RW discs written with the help of Nero Burning ROM. This test only worked with the Sony DW-D22A, so I had to check out the quality in this drive.
|
|
| |
Here’s the quality of the written CD-RW discs. The screenshot of the GSA-4160B has no C2 or C1 errors at all. The screenshot of the Sony DW-D22A has C1 errors, which are not critical. The disc written by the GSA-4082B has C2 errors – that’s rather bad.
|
|
| |
These screenshots show you the results of the DVD+RW quality check test. By the way, you can note that the TDK disc is made by Philips, and the Fujifilm disc is actually produced by Ricoh. The GSA-4082B has the smallest number of PI Failures, although has only the second place in the quality score (well, it’s not quite correct to make direct comparisons with the other drives, as discs from different manufacturers were used with them). The GSA-4160B has got the highest quality score – having made few PI errors as well as PI Failures. The quality score of the disc produced by the Sony DW-D22A is zero – too many PI Errors and Failures.
|
|
| |
The three last screenshots show you the quality of the molded disc with scratches. The LG GSA-4160B is the only device here to have a quality score other than zero. The Sony DW-D22A has the most errors here, but it worked at a higher speed and, as we learned earlier, it finds a higher percentage of C2 errors.
The three tested DVD-burners belong to different product generations, so it’s not correct to compare them directly. Anyway, I will try to single out their weak and strong sides for you.
The LG GSA-4082B has the lowest speed characteristics, which makes it a less appealing buy, in spite of its support of the DVD-RAM format. The disadvantages of the drive include its inadequate quality of processing audio discs (a big offset and errors processing quality media). Its error correction mechanism needs improvement as it let pass a host of C2 Errors. Overall, I wouldn’t recommend this drive to you, even though it costs less than the other two.
The second product from LG, the GSA-4160B model, leaves a better impression. It is truly a multi-format device, also capable of processing dual-layer DVDs, unlike the previous model. It features a good quality of burning, but its insufficiently good C2 error correction mechanism and big offset don’t make it a good choice for creating high-quality audio copies. If it doesn’t set you aback, you may want to consider this device.
The last drive reviewed here, the Sony DW-D22A, has the highest speed characteristics, supports dual-layer DVDs, and a variety of media formats, except the not-very-popular DVD-RAM. Its small offset, efficient error correction mechanism and ability to read all the types of auxiliary information make it a good choice for processing audio discs. The two CD-reading modes should also be considered an advantage, as you don’t always need the maximum speed and can sacrifice speed for the sake of noiselessness. As for disadvantages, the drive was slow when burning a DVD+RW, but this may have been an exceptional case. This drive can be recommended to any user, especially since it costs less than the previous model.
