DVD Capabilities

Next we tested the DVD read capabilities using a single layered pressed DVD: DRAGONS LAIR II, the DVD-Video disk.

As you can see it only has 4 x speed DVD reading, DVD speed reported a reasonable 4838KB average reading speed. Whilst not very fast when compared to the current 16 x drives on the market, it is more than adequate for playback of movies.

DVD Writing

The times for writing a full DVD-R & DVD-RW disk at x 1 will take 57mins, that time should be halved when used with approved media at x2 on DVD-R disks. This makes the A03 the cheapest and fastest writer in the world (upon release). It must also be said that you will only get best performance when used with the recommended media. The DVD-RW capabilities whilst slow at x1 is invaluable (as making a mistake on a DVD-Video disk compliancy can be an expensive afair).

When using a DVD-RW disk for the first time you must do a full erase which will take 57mins to complete, subsequent erases using fast TOC wipe only take 1min 45 seconds.

DVD-RW & DVD-R Compatibility

We copied a Manga movie which had no protection to a DVD-RW disks and tried it on the Samsung 709 DVD player. The disk was not compatible with the player and was ejected, compatability of DVD-RW is less than that of DVD-R due to the reflectivitiy.

On an unbranded DVD-R disk we copied the same MANGA DVD movie and tried it on a Samsung 709 & Pioneer 717. It played like the original with no noticeable delay on both machines.

Conclusion

DVD-R has become affordable thanks to Pioneer. At the time of writing this review, the disks have come down dramatically in price thanks to unbranded DVD-Rs hitting the mainstream, in a few months time I should expect 4.7GB disks to be available for £1 disk.

This drive is not what I would call fast and a lot of patience is required, from the mastering process right through to the actual writing process. If you factor in the time it takes to assemble 4.38 GB of data and then writing it in simulation mode (x1 speed due to the Pioneer not liking many other brand of media) you are talking 4 hours for a complete project.

It also has some issues with media and will not burn at the full speed with many disks. These problems are not minor either, if you dont get a power calibration failure, the application tell you that you have a successful burn it will take twice as long. This problem exists with both CDRs and DVDRs unless you use the very few disks it likes.

This shouldn't put you off buying one though, its has many uses, for example: you could create an MP3 DVD in ISO format and store up to 1,400 MP3 high quality music files onto one disk. The convenience of not having to go through a pile of CDRs for a particular MP3s is great. (Wasn't Maxtor using this to market hard disks not too long ago? :) ) Another usage could be to put Norton Ghost Images of your hard disk onto DVD-R disks, in event of a hard disk failure you have a backup on optical media that doesnt suffer from the drawbacks of magnetic media ex: magentic interference, easily damaged, slow access/transfer rates and at a price of £3 per disk for 4.38GB it is fairly cheap too.

If you are thinking of buying this drive to make your own DVDs for playback on standalone players then your in luck because we tested DVD-R disks created with this drive on Samsung 709 and Pioneer 717 machines and they played perfectly. This is the A03s strongest selling point and is why DVD-RAM never took off.

Hopefully Pioneer will fix the media issues with a firmware upgrade. This drive is a step in the right direction and Pioneer is the first with an affordable option and that combined with the fact that the drive supports so many formats and can make backups of Playstation 2, Hollywood Movies, PC DVD-ROMs, we give it the thumbs up.

Page 7 - Last Updated: 21 October 2001