X-bit labs - Print version

This speed race never stops. The manufacturers have long reached the maximum speed for write-once DVD+R discs, and now they have to pull the DVD-R format up to 16x and then… Well, there isn’t much work to be done after that. They can improve on the write speed for dual-layer DVD+Rs (the available 2.4x media already permit to be burned at 6x) as well as on the rewrite speed for the rewritable formats. As for the latter media, the available RW discs are rated for 4x speed at maximum, but new optical drive models support 6x and even 8x rewrite speeds. It’s not clear when the appropriate media appear, so users have to purchase the device for the future, i.e. they can’t yet use all of the new device’s capabilities today.

There’s another direction of progress the manufacturers have been following already – the introduction of the DVD-R DL format. The future of this format is vague, however, because it’s not clear when such discs are going to come to market, and at what price. The development of the dual-layer technology in general is problematic, by the way. The manufacturers themselves say we can’t expect a quick reduction of the price of such media since their manufacture is complex and isn’t yet fully perfected, and this leads to a low product yield and, accordingly, to high price on the finished product.

The disc makers aren’t willing to correct this situation because they view dual-layer media as a transient format towards high-density DVDs. On the other hand, some people do buy dual-layer discs even at their current price. And if the write/rewrite speeds are ever increasing in new optical drives, then discs rated for such speeds are sure to appear on market soon. And we, at X-bit labs, just go on keeping you informed about new products to make your choice of the optical drive just a little easier.

This article is dedicated to the new drive from LG – the GSA-4163 model – that came to replace the highly successful GSA-4160. It’s easy to guess, even from the numeric index of the new device, that it brings just minor changes, mostly concerned with the supported speeds. Particularly, the GSA-4163 brings the long-awaited 16x burn speed for the DVD-R format. The rewriting speed has also been increased for both DVD-RW and DVD+RW formats. The DVD+R DL burn speed has become higher, too. The other format, DVD-R DL, isn’t supported – this will probably be the main feature of a next model from LG.

But the GSA-4163 is surely an interesting piece of hardware if only because its predecessor earned a good reputation. The users put their confidence in optical drives from LG now, and the new model is selling well, so we’re going to see if this confidence is not misplaced. Is the new model better than the good-all-around GSA-4160, which we have already reviewed before (for details see our article called Three DVD-RW Drives from LG and Sony)?

Closer Look

We received the drive in a kind of “semi-OEM packaging”. It’s rather strange, but there are three shipment versions of this model:

The new drive has the same face as the GSA-4160. You don’t see the decorative gray strip, because it is a feature of the retail version and is missing in the OEM one. Otherwise, it’s the same tray with the likewise rounded corners. There’s still a “Super Multi” symbol on the tray next to the more traditional logotypes of the supported formats. Super Multi means the drive can not only read, but also write to media of the DVD-RAM format.

The indicators and controls are still rather scanty: an eject button (it is curiously shaped but easy to use), a read/write LED indicator (it’s not very informative, being a single-color indicator), and a hole for an emergency extraction of the disc. The overall appearance is a good combination of prudence, elegance and certain minimalism. Now let’s have a look at the device’s rear.

We’ve got a standard selection of connectors here. The new and old models look much alike to each other from this point of view. The connectors’ labels are now placed on the cover of the drive and are not repeated above the connectors, as it was with the LG GSA-4160. There are no vent holes here. The manufacturer must have taken care about the cooling of the device and is sure the electronic components won’t require additional airflow. It is really so – the drive remained rather cool during our tests. Now let’s take a look at its bottom:

As you see, the new model doesn’t have some of those contact pads on the bottom. I don’t know the purpose of that – did they want to make this detail cheaper by making it simpler? I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s really so: the current level of prices on DVD-burners is so low that the manufacturers have to economize on every detail. But it’s all right unless this economization worsens the consumer qualities of the product.

You can see that the PCB layouts of the two drives differ greatly. The PCB itself has become smaller in the newer device, while the chip density has increased. Furthermore, the new device is based on the next-generation R8J322006FPV chipset from Renesas. So, this is really a new model all around rather than a variation of the GSA-4160. It also means we can expect some serious changes in the characteristics and burn quality of the new drive. But this we will learn a bit later, during the tests.

I don’t mention any exclusive features implemented in this model just because the manufacturer does not declare them. That is, the required minimum of technologies is present, like the buffer underrun protection, but there’s nothing out of the ordinary. The only remarkable feature of the drive is its ability to burn DVD-RAM discs, and it has even been improved to support DVD-RAM 5x version 2.2 burning. This function isn’t in high demand, frankly speaking, but if you really need to burn DVD-RAM media, the GSA-4163B may be your only choice. Other manufacturers have long discarded this format in their products.

As I said earlier, the new drive supports 12x and 16x DVD-R burn speeds (the latter speed is supported through P-CAV rather than the CAV algorithm, which is a plus). The speeds for the rewritable formats and for DVD+R DL media have grown up, too.

I hope you’ve got a general description of the device; here is what Nero InfoTool and DVDInfo report about it:

The drive supports such technologies as S.M.A.R.T. and Streaming. As for Mt. Rainier, it is unlikely to appear in DVD-burners soon, although I really don’t understand why.

Performance in CD WinBench 99

The new model doesn’t differ from its predecessor in the read speed on inner as well as on outer tracks because they both have the same speed formula for processing CD media. But the access time of the GSA-4163 is 10 milliseconds better, which is an indication of some changes in the drive’s mechanics since the previous model. On the other hand, the new device puts a bigger load on the CPU. The GSA-4163 has a higher overall score anyway because it is a little faster in random data access and has the same linear read speed.

Performance during CD-R Discs Burning

Both drives take almost the same time to burn a blank at all the tested speeds. The new model is 2-3 seconds slower than the predecessor everywhere but I can’t call this a wide gap. The results are in accordance with the burn speed employed, although I have seen drives perform faster in this test. For example, the Samsung TS-H552B took about 20 seconds less to burn a CD-R blank at 40x speed.

40x Speed

Now let’s see how the new LG reads the disc it has burned at the maximum (40x) speed.

Reading the CD-R disc burned at 40x speed:
LG GSA-4163 (left) and LG GSA-4160B (right)

The drives behave similarly in this test: there are no evident slowdowns, but the graph of the GSA-4163 shows that the spindle rotation speed and the data-transfer rate are kind of trembling a little. This trembling is so negligible, however, that you can regard it as a curious feature of the devices rather than the sign of a defect of some sort.

The average read speed of the drives is, like in CD WinBench 99, identical, but the random access time differs. This time the older model is 8 milliseconds faster – that’s a small difference, but it’s a difference all the same. The burst rate of the new model is lower, too. This parameter doesn’t practically affect the real speed of the device, though, while the disc recognition time is a much more important factor. And the GSA-4163 is again inferior to the older model, taking 2 seconds more to recognize a disc. So, the difference between the two devices is rather small, but the GSA-4160 is ahead in random access and in full disc recognition time subtests.

Ok, let’s move on. The next step in our tests is the quality check of the written CD-R.

Burning/reading the CD-R disc at 40x speed:
LG GSA-4163 (left) and LG GSA-4160B (right)

There are no changes as concerns burning CD-Rs at the maximum speed: the new model uses the four-zone Z-CLV algorithm rather than the ordinary CAV, too. On the one hand, a big portion of the disc is burned at the max speed with Z-CLV, while with CLV the maximum of speed is achieved at the outermost tracks only, closer to the end of the burn session. But on the other hand, there are more time losses with Z-CLV not only when the drive switches from one speed to another, but also on those stretches when the drive “freezes” on the same speed before switching to the higher one. The burned discs were subsequently read without problems – but you can see the same throbbing of speed on the read graph of the disc produced by the newer model. What about its quality?

Quality of the CD-R disc burning at 40x speed:
by LG GSA-4163 (left) and by LG GSA-4160B (right)

The new drive is obviously preferable in this test. The total of C1 errors has diminished almost in double on the disc from the new model (from 11,965 to 5,926); C2 errors are absent in both cases. The average BLER on the disc produced by the GSA-4163 is below 8, which is just an excellent performance. If you take a closer look at the asymmetry graph for the disc written by the GSA-4160B and compare it with the disc burn graph, you can note that the beta value changes exactly at those moments when the drive recalibrates its laser and increases the burn speed. These changes of the beta value may confuse some household readers or obsolete PC drives because the lengths of lands and pits change a little with each recalibration. The asymmetry is almost ideal with the new model, though. It doesn’t go far from the zero mark – I haven’t yet seen a better beta with any of the drives we’ve tested in our labs. The average level and the regularity of jitter are also better with the new model. Thus, the LG GSA-4163 is in every respect better than its predecessor at processing CD-Rs at the maximum speed. Now let’s try to step the burn speed down and see what happens.

24x Speed

Burning/reading the CD-R disc at 24x speed:
LG GSA-4163 (left) and LG GSA-4160B (right)

The Z-CLV algorithm is in use, again. And the program identifies this algorithm correctly for the new device (the burn algorithm is wrongly identified as CLV for the GSA-4160). This is all rather strange because many manufacturers use P-CAV for this burn speed, but LG stubbornly sticks to the outdated Z-CLV. On the other hand, this burn algorithm is simple in implementation – maybe this is going to positively affect the quality of the written discs. The burned disc was really read without errors, but the read graphs resemble those for 40x speed: the maximum read speed is achieved and there are no obvious slowdowns, but the spindle speed and the data-transfer rate are varying a little.

Quality of the CD-R disc burning at 24x speed:
by LG GSA-4163 (left) and by LG GSA-4160B (right)

The new model again performs much better than the GSA-4160. The number of C1 errors has diminished from 18,641 to 5187, i.e. almost in three times. C2 errors appeared on the outermost tracks of the disc written by the new model, but it is a defect of the medium rather than of the tested optical drive – the errors are all grouped at a single spot of the disc. Like at 40x speed, the Beta/Jitter graphs of the GSA-4160B display a step-like increase of the asymmetry at the moment of transitioning from 16x to 24x burn speed. But the beta value is overall quite acceptable, and the graph itself is almost a perfectly flat line (if you don’t count in the moment of the transition). The jitter rate is more uniform than at 40x, but the graph is still somewhat wavy. If you compare these results to the parameters of the disc written by the new model, the difference strikes you immediately: the asymmetry is almost at zero again, while the jitter rate is lower than with the previous model. Thus, the GSA-4163 has again bettered its predecessor, and the difference is quite considerable.

16x Speed

Burning/reading the CD-R disc at 16x speed:
LG GSA-4163 (left) and LG GSA-4160B (right)

The burn session was completed successfully by both devices, but there’s the same instability of speed at reading. It’s not as critical as to make us worry about it, though. Let’s better check out the quality of the disc.

Quality of the CD-R disc burning at 16x speed:
by LG GSA-4163 (left) and by LG GSA-4160B (right)

It’s all very similar, but the winner of this test is the older model which has fewer C1 errors (9,996 against the GSA-4163’s 12,923). The disc burned by the GSA-4160B has some C2 errors (the GSA-4163 has none), but the distribution of these errors is indicative of a defective blank rather than of a fault of the drive itself. The asymmetry is normal in both cases, but the GSA-4163 still boasts a zero-like beta. The jitter rate is higher on the disc written by the new model and is much higher than that on the discs written at 24x and 40x speeds. Yet the overall quality of the disc is very high, without serious defects.

Summarizing the results of the new drive from LG in the CD-R burning tests, I should applaud the new model for its brilliant performance. It is better than the GSA-4160 which in its turn was one of the best models in its class in terms of burning CDs. Now we’ve got a new leader. The quality of the disc written at 16x speed may be somewhat disappointing, as it is lower than the quality of the 40x and 24x discs, but anyway I haven’t registered better results with any other drive. The GSA-4163 is the best in this test.

Performance during CD-RW Media Processing

The older model is quicker in this test, but I don’t consider the difference of 6-10 seconds as a big one. But burning is not only about the time the drive takes to produce a written disc but, and more importantly, about the quality of this disc. Let’s examine it, then!

The program wrongly identified the burn algorithm employed by the GSA-4160: it says CLV while the drive actually uses Z-CLV. But it’s all right with the GSA-4163. The burn session was completed successfully – the graphs are straight and clear, without any jaggedness. The burned discs were read without errors. Yet you can see the “exclusive” vibration of speed here, again.

Quality of the 24x CD-RW disc burning:
by LG GSA-4163 (left) and by LG GSA-4160B (right)

The new model wins another test! It has five times less C1 errors and no C2 errors at all (well, the GSA-4160 produced no C2 errors, either). The results of the new model are impressive, especially considering the type of the medium: the BLER is low, save for a minor surge at the outermost tracks. This surge never goes beyond 50-60 and that’s quite allowable even for CD-R, not to mention CD-RW discs. The asymmetry of the disc written by the GSA-4163 still rests on the zero mark – there’s no trace of the transition to the higher speed as in the graph of the GSA-4160. The jitter of the disc produced by the new model is better, too, with a minor surge when the drive switches the burn speed. So, the LG GSA-4163 seems much better than the previous model in this test. Let’s see what we have with 32x CD-RWs.

Burning/reading the 32x CD-RW disc at 24x speed:
LG GSA-4163 (left) and LG GSA-4160B (right)

There were no problems during the burning/reading of the discs. The graphs are similar to what we have seen with the 24x CD-RW, so let’s get right to the quality check.

Quality of the 32x CD-RW disc burning at 24x speed:
by LG GSA-4163 (left) and by LG GSA-4160B (right)

The distribution of errors on the two discs is similar: there’s a peak of C1 errors at the beginning of the medium. This peak quite suddenly goes down as the drive achieves its maximum burn speed. The new model, however, has a much better total of C1 errors. The asymmetry on the disc written by the GSA-4163 is still very close to zero, and the jitter rate is lower and more uniform than on the disc burned by the previous model. The GSA-4163 gave out a good disc, considering it doesn’t officially support 32x burn speed for CD-RWs.

Thus, the new model is better than the older one with rewritable CD media, too. The manufacturer has managed to improve the good performance of the GSA-4160, and the new GSA-4163 delivers excellent quality with all the tested media.

Performance during Reading Damaged CD-ROM Discs

Our checking the error correction mechanism by reading a damaged CD-ROM concludes the CD-related part of this review.

The error correction mechanism proved to be almost identical in both devices, save for the new model’s increasing its speed a little earlier and faster after the bad area. That’s why it took less time to read the whole disc: 5 minutes 57 seconds against the GSA-4160’s 6 minutes and 13 seconds. On the other hand, the previous model has two unread blocks, while the new one – four unread blocks. So, the new drive has become faster than its predecessor, but is less accurate at reading bad blocks.

Performance during DVD Discs Reading

Reading single-layer and dual-leayer molded DVD-ROM discs:
LG GSA-4163 (left) and LG GSA-4160B (right)

The single-layer DVD Video disc provoked no problems – both drives read it carefully and steadily, without any slowdowns. The same is true for the dual-layer medium – no errors, smooth graphs. Note also that there’s no artificial slowing-down of the drives when they’re processing DVD Video discs. More exactly, it occurs with dual-layer DVDs only – the maximum speed is then really limited at 8x, as the specification says. It’s more curious with single-layer ones: the maximum should be either 8x (as this is a Video disc) or 16x (DVD-ROM), but we have 10x, which is the maximum read speed for write-once DVDs.

DVD Burning Quality

Verbatim DataLifePlus discs (manufactured by Mitsubishi Chemical and Taiyo Yuden) were used for the tests. Let’s first see how much time it takes to burn a blank.

DVD-R: The previous model refused to burn DVD-R discs at 4x speed. As for the GSA-4163, it did burn a DVD-R at 4x but only in Nero Burning ROM. When I tried to burn one in Nero CD Speed, the minimal speed the drive would agree upon was 8x. So, I can’t say the drive has got rid of its oddities – they are just changed in the new model. At 8x speed the new drive is 12 seconds faster than the older one, but this difference is insignificant with the absolute speeds being something like 7-8 minutes.

DVD+R: Like with the “minus” format, the previous model refused to work at 4x or 8x, choosing the intermediate speed of 6x. The new model also wouldn’t work at 4x or 8x in Nero CD Speed. However, I did burn DVD+R discs at 4x and 8x speeds using Nero Burning ROM. So, we’ve got a kind of incompatibility of LG’s drives with Nero CD Speed. The new model could also write an 8x medium at 16x speed, which the GSA-4160 couldn’t repeat. So, we can only compare the speeds of the drives at 12x only where the new model is slightly (27 seconds) ahead of its predecessor. That’s a small but noticeable gap.

DVD+RW: The drives have almost identical speeds when burning discs of this format. The difference amounts to only several seconds.

DVD-RW: Again, the drives take almost the same time to burn a blank of this format at the maximum speed. The previous model refused to burn a disc at 2x, while the GSA-4163 performed this task successfully, turning in an average time.

Single-Write (Non-Rewritable) Media

Now we can check out how good the new drive is at burning DVD media. Single-write (non-rewritable) formats first.

As I said above, the drive could only work at this speed in Nero Burning ROM, so I can’t offer you a graph of the burn session. The subsequent reading of the burned disc was performed without problems, making us expect a high-quality disc.

The result doesn’t meet the expectations, though. The quality is obviously bad, with tall and lengthy surges of PI errors and failures all around the disc. Once again we meet an optical drive in which the developer pays little attention to optimization of the burn strategies for the lowest burn speeds. The developers must have decided that 4x media were already obsolete. On the other hand, this may be due to me using not a 4x blank, but an 8x medium which is optimized for a higher burn speed.

Beta/Jitter and TA Test (Inner, Middle, Outer)
for the disc burned by the LG GSA-4163B

The asymmetry is normal; its fluctuations fit within the acceptable range. But the jitter rate is high and is not uniform. That is, the jitter rate is increasing considerably in the second half of the disc. TA Test, however, says it’s all right with the jitter: its uniformity might be better of course, but the drive has no problems with maintaining the required pit/land lengths, save for 3T. The drive “underburns” 3T lengths due to some errors in its firmware. So, I’m inclined to think that there’s a minor defect in the burn strategy coupled with the use of a high-speed medium, because the drive’s optics work well. Now let’s increase the speed to 8x.

Both devices use the Z-CLV algorithm at 8x. It’s rather strange considering that other manufacturers are all transitioning to P-CAV. But of course I won’t regard this as a drawback if the quality of the resulting disc proves to be high. Both drives finished their burn sessions successfully. Curiously enough, the new model reaches the max speed a little earlier than the older model, but has a higher total burn time. The burned disc was read without fluctuations or slumps of speed.

The quality of the disc produced by the two drives is very similar. The new model has fewer PI errors, but more PI failures. The latter thing comes from the GSA-4163’s having two small-length peaks of PI failures which are due to a defect of the medium. Overall, the new model produces discs of a somewhat higher quality than the GSA-4160B does.

Beta/Jitter and TA Test (Inner, Middle, Outer)
for the disc burned by the LG GSA-4163B

The asymmetry graph clearly shows the moment the drive switched to 8x burn speed. Afterwards the beta graph is almost a flat line. A peak of the jitter also coincides with the moment of switching between the speeds, and then the jitter rate is steadily going down towards the outer tracks. So, the jitter and asymmetry are both good, and TA Test agrees with that: the jitter is minimal, adjacent zones do not overlap, the average pit/land lengths fully comply with their etalon values. So, the new model performs 8x burning excellently, across all the parameters involved. Unfortunately, it refused to burn 8x discs at 12x speed, so we can switch to the competing DVD+R format now.

Again I can’t offer you the burn graph, since Nero CD Speed didn’t offer this burn speed and I had to write the blank in Nero Burning ROM. The burned disc was read without errors or slowdowns. As for the quality, we’ve got an excellent disc here, unlike in the DVD-R 4x test. The rate of PI errors and failures is very low, and the low total of PI errors (9276) also testifies to the high quality of the disc. Considering this excellent performance, I now suppose the bad result of the DVD-R 4x test was more due to the deficient burn strategy rather than to the use of a high-speed blank.

Beta/Jitter and TA Test (Inner, Middle, Outer)
for the disc burned by the LG GSA-4163B

The asymmetry is excellent: the fluctuations are small, so the graph is almost a perfectly flat line. But you may notice that the beta value and the jitter rate are growing up towards the outermost tracks of the disc, probably due to the laser power correction. TA Test confirms the high quality of the disc: the jitter is low, without overlaps of adjacent pit/land lengths in the diagram. The overall result is somewhat spoiled by the rather high Peak Shift, i.e. the average pit/land lengths are a little shorter than they should be.

The previous model of the LG drive wouldn’t burn the test disc at 8x speed (agreeing on 6x at most), so I publish the results for the new model only. The burn graph you see shows my attempt to write the disc in Nero CD Speed at 8x speed: the device burns the disc at 12x anyway. I could only burn the disc at 8x in Nero Burning ROM, but I can’t offer you the burn graph. The written disc was read without errors, and its quality is beyond praise: the total of PI errors is very low (5526), and the average PI error rate is below 5. That’s almost perfect quality! So, the GSA-4163 works better with DVD+R than with DVD-R media at 8x speed.

Beta/Jitter and TA Test (Inner, Middle, Outer)
for the disc burned by the LG GSA-4163B

The beta value is always in the acceptable range; the average level and uniformity of jitter is acceptable, too. The results of TA Test somewhat spoil this bright picture, though. The new model has problems maintaining the required pit/land lengths, especially in the middle of the disc and on the outermost tracks. But the overall quality of the disc is high, anyway. There are some flaws, but who is perfect in this world?

Both devices use a three-zone Z-CLV algorithm here. They also switch from one zone to another in the same time, so the burn sessions had almost the same duration. There were no problems during the burning process as the clear and smooth graphs show. The discs were subsequently read without problems, too.

You get high-quality DVD+R disc with both drives, but the GSA-4163 is better among the two. The total of PI errors is much smaller (6215 against 8666) on the disc burned by the new model, and the total of PI failures is better almost in double, too. So, the GSA-4163 surpasses its predecessor in tests by a small but stable margin from disc to disc.

Beta/Jitter and TA Test (Inner, Middle, Outer)
for the disc burned by the LG GSA-4163B

The jitter is within the norm and is uniform on the entire disc. The asymmetry is normal, too. The graph clearly shows the moments where the drive switches between the burn speeds. What’s curious, the laser power and, accordingly, the beta value are going down rather than up on each step of the Z-CLV algorithm. TA Test says the drive finds it difficult to maintain the required pit/land lengths, especially on the second half of the disc at 8x speed. The deviations of the lengths are small and slightly affect the overall result, though.

At last we see LG’s drives use P-CAV! It’s nice the new model, unlike the earlier ones, uses this algorithm rather than CAV for 16x burning because it brings in a real time gain. The time gain over 12x speed is small, but quite noticeable. There were no evident slowdowns during the burn session. The drive also easily read the burned disc.

As for the quality of the disc, it is high: the PI error rate is higher than at 12x, but it’s expectable considering the employed burn algorithm. Then, the total of PI errors is rather small, so I have no serious complaints about the quality.

Beta/Jitter and TA Test (Inner, Middle, Outer)
for the disc burned by the LG GSA-4163B

The asymmetry has worsened if compared with 12x burning, but its fluctuations fit within the acceptable range. The jitter rate follows suit, fluctuating widely on the second half of the medium. Yet if you look at the results of TA Test, the drive quite successfully maintains the required pit/land lengths even at the maximum burn speed. There are minor overlaps at 3T-5T, but they don’t affect the quality of the disc much. Again, the overall quality is good here.

The dual-layer medium was burned and then read without problems; both drives reached their maximum declared read speed. We can now examine the quality of the discs, but don’t forget that the previous model did the burning at 2.4x, while the GSA-4163 at 4x.

The rate of PI errors and failures is higher on the first layer of both discs, but the results of the GSA-4163 are considerably worse because of the higher burn speed employed. The disc burned by the new model has 10 times more PI errors than the disc produced by the GSA-4160. Thus, the total number of PI errors is 17 times better with the previous drive model. As for PI failures, the GSA-4160 has 18 times less of them. The PI error rate on the disc from the GSA-4163 is in fact close to the acceptable limit. The burn strategy evidently calls for improvement here.

First layer
Inner	Middle	Outer
Second layer
Inner	Middle	Outer

The asymmetry varies in a rather wide range on the first and second layer of the disc, but never goes out of the acceptable range. The increase of the laser power is clearly seen as the drive goes over to the second layer of the medium. The jitter rate goes down at that, again indicating that the second layer is manufactured better than the first one.

Despite the rather high error rate at reading, the results of TA Test suggest that the new model can keep the pit/land lengths just as they should be. Adjacent lengths do not overlap in the diagram, and the Peak Shift value is low. All in all, the disc is burned with a better quality than one might think looking at the total number of PI error and failure blocks.

Rewritable Media

The burn/read graphs have a clear and smooth shape, betraying no troubles during these operations. The quality of the resulting disc is highest, too. The PI error rate is very low, while the average PI failure rate is about 2, which is acceptable. It’s the more acceptable since we deal with a rewritable medium where quality is harder to achieve than with write-once formats.

Beta/Jitter and TA Test (Inner, Middle, Outer)
for the disc burned by the LG GSA-4163B

The asymmetry varies but little – the beta value is zero in the first half of the disc. The jitter rate is normal and uniform along the entire medium, indicating a good quality of the disc. TA Test agrees with that: the adjacent lengths overlap but little, so the jitter is low. The overall result is reduced due to the rather average Peak Shift, i.e. the average pit/land lengths deviate from the required ones. The drive makes them a little shorter than the standard demands.

Without any troubles, slumps or variations of speed, the drives successfully completed the burning and reading of the discs. The new model again boasts better results than the GSA-4160. The total number of PI errors has diminished from 35,456 to 21,498 with the new drive, and I’d call it a big difference. The total of PI failures is higher on the disc from the GSA-4163, though. On the other hand, this high total comes mostly from the two small-length spikes of PI failures, which don’t affect the overall quality of the medium much. Thus, the GSA-4163 again improves on the results of its predecessor.

Beta/Jitter and TA Test (Inner, Middle, Outer)
for the disc burned by the LG GSA-4163B

The asymmetry is normal, its fluctuations are small. The jitter rate is low and keeps on about the same level through the entire disc. The results of TA Test also agree that we have an excellent quality of burning here!

The burn session was completed without a hitch. When reading the written disc, the GSA-4160 slowed down somewhat at the outermost tracks, while the new model didn’t.

The problem we saw with the previous model persists with the new one: the PI error rate is growing up exponentially to the 200 mark at the middle of the disc and to over 1200 at the outermost tracks. The PO error rate is about 60-70 – that’s no good at all. The total number of PI errors and failures is smaller on the disc written by the GSA-4163 but not enough small – the new model burns DVD+RW discs badly at the minimal speed. It finds it easy to read the resulting disc, but I wouldn’t guarantee that the disc is readable in other drives.

Beta/Jitter and TA Test (Inner, Middle, Outer)
for the disc burned by the LG GSA-4163B

The Beta/Jitter graphs are good overall: rather flat, with minor deviations. The average jitter rate is low. Both beta and jitter are going up towards the outer tracks, but this growth isn’t as high as the growth of the error rate. The results of TA Test, however, suggest that the new drive cannot maintain the required pit/land lengths: adjacent lengths overlap rather badly on the entire surface of the disc. So, the new drive fails this test, and an immediate reaction from the manufacturer is necessary for this single burn mode not to spoil the overall pleasant impression from the device.

Here, both devices burn and read the discs without troubles. Maybe the quality is better, too? Yes, we’ve got excellent discs here! The new model is a bit worse than the older one in terms of the total number of PI errors and failures. But the difference is really very small.

Beta/Jitter and TA Test (Inner, Middle, Outer)
for the disc burned by the LG GSA-4163B

The asymmetry is normal – its fluctuations are within the acceptable range. The average jitter rate and its uniformity are normal, too. It’s all right so far. The results of TA Test become another confirmation of the high quality of the disc: the new model maintains the required pit/land lengths well – the adjacent lengths don’t practically overlap in the diagram. That’s a good result all around.

Summarizing the performance of the new model with DVD media, I can’t but acknowledge that the GSA-4163 surpasses its predecessor almost everywhere. I’m only sad that the manufacturer didn’t solve the problem of low quality of burning DVD+RWs at the min speed. The algorithms of burning dual-layer media need improvement, too. But despite these drawbacks, the LG GSA-4163 leaves a nice impression; it is one of the best optical drives for burning DVDs today. Added the excellent results with CD media, we have a device that suits perfectly for burning optical media of almost any type and format.

Audio Capturing

The first thing remarkable is the zero write offset. This is a clear advantage at processing audio data. The combined offset is not zero, though, but the ability of the drive to read 141 sectors from the Lead-In area helps to correct the relatively high read offset. Thus, the GSA-4163 suits well for processing audio.

As for the real audio grabbing, the results of the two models are almost identical. The difference is negligible really.

The drive read the damaged Audio CD rather well. As for returning C2 errors, the result is perfect – 100% accuracy. Not a single skip found at that, by the way. So, the GSA-4163 performs quite well in this test – it manages to improve on the results of the GSA-4160 which were already good enough.

Sheep Test

You can read the description of this test here. In brief, its point is simple: the ability of the drive to copy discs protected with various versions of Safe Disc is tested. The developers of the popular CloneCD program have the following classification of optical drives, according to this test:

Conclusion

The LG GSA-4163 is a good device all around, a worthy substitute to the successful GSA-4160B model. The new model has surpassed its predecessor, though. A few minor defects have been left over since the older drive, but these are not critical and don’t spoil the overall impression from the device.

The quiet and cool operation and the excellent quality of optical discs burning make the GSA-4163 one of the best everyday-use drives of the last generation. You won’t find any advanced features for evaluating the quality of the burned discs here, but the GSA-4163 doesn’t need them. It is intended for those users who simply burn their discs and that’s all. The only disturbing thing is that the manufacturer didn’t correct the problem with writing DVD+RWs at the minimal speed – this defect was spotted back in the previous model.

So, if your goal is to burn discs quickly and well, the GSA-4163 is going to be the best choice for today. Add also the support of the DVD-RAM format, which can be a vitally important feature for some users. To our regret we couldn’t check out all of the new device’s capabilities (particularly, DVD-R DL burning and high DVD rewrite speeds) due to the absence of the appropriate media. But even without that we are absolutely sure about the high potential of the LG GSA-4163.

Quality of DVD-R disc burning at 8x speed
LG GSA-4163B	LG GSA-4160B

Quality of 8x DVD+R disc burning at 12x speed
LG GSA-4163B	LG GSA-4160B

Quality of DVD+R DL disc burning
LG GSA-4163B	LG GSA-4160B

Quality of DVD-RW disc burning at 4x speed
LG GSA-4163B	LG GSA-4160B

Quality of DVD+RW disc burning at 2.4x speed
LG GSA-4163B	LG GSA-4160B

Quality of DVD+RW disc burning at 4x speed
LG GSA-4163B	LG GSA-4160B

LG GSA-4163B DVD±RW Dual Layer Burner Review: New Member in a Successful Family

Closer Look

Performance in CD WinBench 99

Performance during CD-R Discs Burning

40x Speed

24x Speed

16x Speed

Performance during CD-RW Media Processing

Performance during Reading Damaged CD-ROM Discs

Performance during DVD Discs Reading

DVD Burning Quality

Single-Write (Non-Rewritable) Media

Rewritable Media

Audio Capturing

Sheep Test

Conclusion