PX-708A 8x Burning Slow-Down

by **tazdevl** on Fri Sep 19, 2003 6:24 pm

I've dealt with Jack, he's a good guy. Unfortuntately, he does have the attitude that nothing could ever be wrong with a Plex product... last thing someone who is having problems with one of their drives wants to hear. What I would rather hear is that he will forward the issue to either a firmware engineer or the product manager (who should be keeping track of a bug report) for further investigation.

He does have a checklist that he has to go through. In the majority of the cases, I'm sure those simple solutions will fix the problems.

Bob, no one should have to do a fresh install for an optical drive. That's completely unreasonable and makes no sense. Optical drive isn't as pervasive as a graphics card.

by **skypx** on Fri Sep 19, 2003 6:35 pm

bobmitchell wrote:I think that the issue is really with sensitivity. If the problems persist...simply e mail Plextor at support@plextor.com Be informational. Give as much "data" as you can. Last evening...Jim emailed back and forth at least 5 times with me...and each time...I gave him more to work with. Even he was convinced that the quality of the media is imperative...where in the beginning he gave me all the stock answers on how to reistall the drive. Sorry...but I have just finished a fresh install of Windows XP two days ago...can't be that.

Supply Plextor with facts. At present...Jim's last E Mail stated that Plextor experienced NO slowdowns in the lab after the firmware update. I believe that...I have dealt with Plextor for over four years...and they have always been helpful. Plextor tech support has been some of the BEST I have ever experienced over this time...and I believe that they will look into this. If you have problems...let them know. Give full system descriptions...tell as much as you can in detail and let them play. Hopefully...someone will notice something in one of the configurations that you send...that that will be that. Persistance...don't attack...Don't know what else we can do.

Bob

Bob, very informative! I will take your advice. Thank you.

by **skypx** on Fri Sep 19, 2003 7:06 pm

tazdevl wrote:Bob, no one should have to do a fresh install for an optical drive. That's completely unreasonable and makes no sense. Optical drive isn't as pervasive as a graphics card.

I agree, but I think camly making Plextor aware of the problem will go a long way.

by **VEFF** on Fri Sep 19, 2003 8:42 pm

bobmitchell wrote:CompUSA took em back even though I had opened each and every disk. When three out of the lot was bad...they just took them back. I'd open em and check them. If they work...keep them...after all...they should be Ricoh brand.

Bob

If you come up with one out of the three bad...take em back...

I'll give them a try and see what happens, especially since 4X +RW discs (other than Memorex) are not easy to find.

by **VEFF** on Fri Sep 19, 2003 11:12 pm

Success at 4X, and the files were readbale afterwards.
It is funny how slow 4X burning (to +RW discs) seems after burning at 8X (to +R) for two weeks...

by **technics** on Mon Sep 22, 2003 4:11 am

technics wrote:right after the firmware flash i rebooted and my drive was redetected by windows, so i thought everything would be allright.
i still gave that hint a try, i also reinstalled nero60011 (deleted all registry entries also), then i tried to burn a sony4x (mcc 002) and to my surprise: it worked just fine 7:53 for a full disc it took kinda long to write the lead-out, but oh well, 8x finally works for me, thats all i'm asking for

ok i did some more testing and it doesnt work anymore, i tried verbatim datalife+ (mcc002) now, went from 6x straight to 4x and nero 60011 couldn't close the disc anymore. i am pretty fed up with this, i burned 2 discs out of 15 "8x" at real 8x :\

btw anyone read the review @ cdrinfo ? they mentioned the same slowdown... still some work to do for the plextor engineers...

edit: now i tried some ricoh4x, burned fine with nero, almost full disc took 7:34, no slowdown, nothing, also closed fine. pretty strange how cheap ricoh discs burn fine without any problems and the verbatim discs dont... :-?

by **bob11879** on Mon Sep 22, 2003 1:42 pm

Talked to a guy in Tech Support that seemed to know what he was saying. Since there is no 8X media available, Plextor tested the 4X media currently on the market and most of it would write at 8X. But there is still inconsistant quality between discs, even in the same spindle. Plextor's PoweRec monitors the disc error rate and will slow the burn down to maintain quality. If it reaches 8x in part of the burn, then slows down, it is disc quality, not the drive or firmware. If it doesnt't reach 8x, then the disc quality isn't good enough. This should all be moot when 8x media starts hitting the shelves.

by **VEFF** on Mon Sep 22, 2003 2:23 pm

bob11879 wrote:Talked to a guy in Tech Support that seemed to know what he was saying. Since there is no 8X media available, Plextor tested the 4X media currently on the market and most of it would write at 8X. But there is still inconsistant quality between discs, even in the same spindle. Plextor's PoweRec monitors the disc error rate and will slow the burn down to maintain quality. If it reaches 8x in part of the burn, then slows down, it is disc quality, not the drive or firmware. If it doesnt't reach 8x, then the disc quality isn't good enough. This should all be moot when 8x media starts hitting the shelves.

I have burned a bunch of discs (video and data) at 8X with my PX-708A fw 1.00 (TDK, Memorex and Verbatim with a media ID = Ricoh Japan R01) and Verbatim with media ID = MCC...), and I have had no real problems with consistency - no coasters and no problems with unreadable or skipping discs.
I used Nero 6.0.0.11 and Stomp RecordNow Max 4.5 (with the latest Prassi (PX) engine (390 I believe?) prior to the Sonic website one, that says it is for RecordNow Max 4.6 - which I have not heard of) for ~ 95% of those burns.

The Plextor is hooked up as master (on an FIC AM37 mobo for HP BTO PC).

by **Ian** on Mon Sep 22, 2003 5:54 pm

Ah yes. I too am seeing the slow down problem with Memorex media. My TDK 4x discs are ID'd the same and work fine.

by **VEFF** on Mon Sep 22, 2003 9:22 pm

Guess I'll stick with 1.00 then, since there is no slowdown.

Hopefully there are no side effects to the burner NOT slowing down, as is the case with 1.00.
My discs are easily readable; I guess that is all that matters...

by **Ian** on Mon Sep 22, 2003 9:25 pm

Verbatim DataLifePlus too.. arrghh..

I've had two discs fail when writing the leadout too. I have a feeling that's a Nero problem though.

by **tazdevl** on Mon Sep 22, 2003 11:14 pm

Bah everyone email Ahead... their techs seem to think that the drive is working OK with Nero.

by **VEFF** on Mon Sep 22, 2003 11:31 pm

I have had NO problems with Nero 6.0.0.11 (and Stomp RecordNow Max 4.5) and the PX-708A with firmware 1.00
I have burned Video DVD+Rs, a data DVD+R and a data DVD+RW.

I'm not sure why some people are having problems (assuming they are using the same version of Nero I listed), other than some kind of chipset conflict or...?

by **technics** on Tue Sep 23, 2003 2:38 am

Ian wrote:Verbatim DataLifePlus too.. arrghh..

I've had two discs fail when writing the leadout too. I have a feeling that's a Nero problem though.

the weird thing here is, that the only discs where that happend for me are verbatim... i used the same nero/alcohol version for all my discs.

bob11879 wrote:Talked to a guy in Tech Support that seemed to know what he was saying. Since there is no 8X media available, Plextor tested the 4X media currently on the market and most of it would write at 8X. But there is still inconsistant quality between discs, even in the same spindle. Plextor's PoweRec monitors the disc error rate and will slow the burn down to maintain quality. If it reaches 8x in part of the burn, then slows down, it is disc quality, not the drive or firmware. If it doesnt't reach 8x, then the disc quality isn't good enough. This should all be moot when 8x media starts hitting the shelves.

its kinda hard to believe that those sony/verbatim discs have such "low" quality that they go straight to 4x. even with the tdk i couldnt do a full disc @8x, but the cheap ricohs do burn fine, or was it just bad luck with my discs?! :-?

by **hoxlund** on Tue Sep 23, 2003 11:16 am

theres a new patch for 6.0.0.15 and the latest 5 version of nero

install it and see if your burns are better:

http://www.cdrlabs.com/#2

by **tazdevl** on Tue Sep 23, 2003 9:53 pm

FOOK! Tried 60015 with patch, won't finalze, have 2 new drink coasters.

VEFF if there's some way for you to extract the 1.00 firmware, I'm sure a bunch of us would like to get our hands on it.

by **VEFF** on Tue Sep 23, 2003 10:10 pm

tazdevl wrote:FOOK! Tried 60015 with patch, won't finalze, have 2 new drink coasters.

VEFF if there's some way for you to extract the 1.00 firmware, I'm sure a bunch of us would like to get our hands on it.

That sucks!

I would be happy to, but I don't think it is possible with this drive, due to the chipset used.
If anyone finds a method, before 1.02 comes out, let me know.
The thing is 4 to 1 prefer 1.01, according to the poll at least. I know it isn't scientific, and there weren't that many votes, so the sample size is small, and even a few votes can skew the stats...

Did you try going (back) to 6.0.0.11?
Since that works fine, I haven't tried 6.0.0.15 or other versions for that matter.

by **tazdevl** on Tue Sep 23, 2003 10:18 pm

60011 seems to work OK.

I will have to say I just noticed that @ 20% completed on 2 burns, the buffer fluctuation begins and continues through the rest of the disc.

I hope OCFreak sends his results to the gang @ Plextor.

EDIT * DOUBLE FOOK just went back to 60011... had 1 good and 2 bad burns... disc won't finalize.

I'd say bad media, but other folks are coming across problems as well. Tried 2 batches of TDK +R

by **tazdevl** on Tue Sep 23, 2003 10:54 pm

Well, got an email from the big J man @ Plex. He's saying it's a media issue, though I find it odd that we are all having issues.

He also suggested using Verbatim media... but based on Ian's comments, I'm not sure if that will make a difference.

That's a media issue, for sure. When the software gets that far, it's erroring on writing the lead out tracks on the disc.

We know Nero has a problem with their 6.x software with many drives that they are working on resolving.

We have found the best results with Verbatim media.

Thing that bothers me, I have zero issues with my 510 and Nero.

by **hoxlund** on Tue Sep 23, 2003 11:09 pm

haha taz, amen to that, i don't have a single problem with my sony and nero either

by **VEFF** on Tue Sep 23, 2003 11:55 pm

But if it is the media (or even Nero), then how come with fw 1.00, I have had ZERO issues, with all of the following media (and software), in various combinations:

Media: TDK 4X +R, Verbatim 4X +R (both MCC and Ricoh) and 4X
Memorex +R media

Software: Nero 6.0.0.11 and Stomp RecordNow Max 4.5

by **tazdevl** on Wed Sep 24, 2003 12:16 am

That's my point with Plex. They have the same attitude that Apple does i.e. nothing is wrong with our product.

I linked to this thread. Bet no one from Plex reads it.

Plex believes that the 708A is too unique for everything it interacts with... I think the 708A is uniquely flawed.

They also keep blaming Nero, chipset and IDE drivers. Problem is, standards exist that should make all these things a non-issue. As I said, I think the drive is flawed and I'm about ready to take it back. I'll head out and try one other brand, but given the cost of DVD media, I'm not going out of the way for a drive. I'll yank it out and wait for Sony's 8X drive.

by **aviationwiz** on Fri Sep 26, 2003 5:10 pm

Just did another burn at 8x on a disk that is 4,198MB. The slow-down only occured at 99%, which I think is normal, and even if it's not, not a big deal at all. 7 min. and 52 seconds total.

by **VEFF** on Mon Sep 29, 2003 10:20 pm

I just upgraded to 1.01
I want the benefits of higher burn quality.
If it slows down near the end of the burn, so be it...

I'll try a Memorex 4X +R and post my results.

by **VEFF** on Mon Sep 29, 2003 10:34 pm

Burned a full 4466 MB in Nero 6.0.0.11 at 8X using Memorex 4X +R.
It did 8X up until 97% then it dropped to 4X for the rest of the burn.
Total burn time was 8:29 including lead-in and lead-out.

The burn completed successfully. I am not worried about the extra seconds it took, as long as it was in the name of more reliable quality.

I'll try TDK 4X +R media next, just to see what happens.
Then I'll try MCC 4X +R media...

PX-708A 8x Burning Slow-Down

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