LiteOn 811S Burn "review"

by **Rockymaru** on Sun Dec 28, 2003 4:29 am

Just installed this baby today. I was a little worried at first, because when I turned the computer back on (this was after I had successfully installed the drive, rebooted, and turned it off later), it gave me about 5-6 Windows error messages; yet was able to burn fine. Anyone else encounter this? See my spec's below.

Anyways, I burned a few SVCD's (using 80 min TDKs at 40X w/ Nero 6) w/o any problems, and wow it's top notch. I'm so used to my ancient HP CD-Writer Plus 8100 (anyone remember them?). But even so, at 40X, it burned full 800MB BIN SVCDs file in 3 minutes and slightly less! So it seems the CD writing itself is not just a "thrown in."

As for DVDs, I have yet to try it. I hope those Windows errors were nothing to worry about (again, so far so good...) Is Nero any good at making 100% backups of DVD movies? Any suggestions on good backup programs besides Nero (that are compatible w/ said Liteon 811S)?

by **Dartman** on Sun Dec 28, 2003 5:35 am

Double check that your Buffer under run protection is till enabled with the 811 as mine defaulted to off for some reason. You might also want to check that UDMA 2 is enabled on the IDE channel it's on. I spose the program that came with it should work great, I never installed it. Others use record NOW I think with good results.
The HSOE firmware seems pretty good, the newer one gave me more errors with my cheap RITEKGO4 media.
I don't know why you got the error messages, XP said detecting new device and there it was. I did also have to remove and let it reinstall the IDE channel mine was on because it was in PIO only mode but it seems to be sorted out pretty good now.
It seems to create CD's with VERY low errors.

by **RJW** on Sun Dec 28, 2003 8:44 am

Yeah the new lite on dvd burners are excellent cd-burners. For DVD's there are quite decent and above average.

by **Rockymaru** on Sun Dec 28, 2003 2:43 pm

Dartman wrote:Double check that your Buffer under run protection is till enabled with the 811 as mine defaulted to off for some reason. You might also want to check that UDMA 2 is enabled on the IDE channel it's on. I spose the program that came with it should work great, I never installed it. Others use record NOW I think with good results.
The HSOE firmware seems pretty good, the newer one gave me more errors with my cheap RITEKGO4 media.
I don't know why you got the error messages, XP said detecting new device and there it was. I did also have to remove and let it reinstall the IDE channel mine was on because it was in PIO only mode but it seems to be sorted out pretty good now.
It seems to create CD's with VERY low errors.

1. What's funny is, when using Nero, it was defaulted on to use Buffer under-run protection as well as Smart Burn. So I didn't have to worry about that

2. Forgive me for sounding like a n00b, but how do I check that "UDMA 2 is enabled"? What is it even?
3. As far as what software mine came w/, Sonic MyDVD and PowerDVD XP (I use WinDVD personally) are included. I suppose I *COULD* try MyDVD, but am unsure if it's a proven/efficient program for making backups of DVD movies. That is why I asked if anyone had recommendations for a better prog. Unfortunately, it seems CD-RWin doesn't recognize, or support, the 811S.
4. Yes, you're correct in regards to how I installed my burner. Upon turning on the computer after installing, XP detected it fine. I even installed Sonic MyDVD from the DVD burner. Fine. Turn off PC. Come back later, turn it on, all hell. Yet it burned 6 CD-Rs flawlessly.

I will now attempt to make a back-up copy of a DVD movie (Hmmmm..haven't quite decided yet, leaning towards Return of the Living Dead or Killer Klowns from Outer Space lol :lol:

)

by **Dartman** on Sun Dec 28, 2003 2:59 pm

Go into the system properties and find the hardware section then look at the device manager. Look under IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers, find the channel your drive is on and look at advanced properties. The mode it's in should be listed for each channel and with luck if it's not DMA2 you can change it, If you can't, uninstall the bad channel and let XP refind it, that usually fixes it.
There is a good guide with pictures in the tech help section here somewhere if you need it.

by **dodecahedron** on Sun Dec 28, 2003 4:07 pm

DMA FAQs

check out the FAQ:
How to enable DMA in Windows XP (with pictures)
Problems enabling DMA in Windows XP
What are DMA and UDMA ?

CDRWin is old, most likely doesn't support the 811.
anyway it doesn't write DVDs, only CDs.

by **Dartman** on Sun Dec 28, 2003 4:12 pm

I knew someone would post it :wink:

by **dodecahedron** on Sun Dec 28, 2003 4:32 pm

Dartman wrote:I knew someone would post it

why do you think they made me FAQ forum moderator? :wink:

by **Dartman** on Sun Dec 28, 2003 4:51 pm

AHHH! a stealth moderator.....

by **Rockymaru** on Sun Dec 28, 2003 6:05 pm

Heads up! Here is the DVD+R result. But first a word from our sponser! :lol:

OK, Deadman, thank you for directing me towards determining whether or not I was using DMA2 mode - which it was indeed set at, fortunately. I didn't need the FAQ links, dode, I'm not that stupid

LOL jk. Thanks for helping out anyway. Perhaps in the future, it may be of some use.

On to the results. The lucky DVD movie was "Spaceballs"

. I assumed at first that Nero could rip and burn DVD's on the fly. Well, even though I'm using the very latest Nero version, and considering Spaceballs is a DVD that came out two years ago, I was shocked that there was adequate protection on it and couldn't. So I tried SmartRipper.

Anyways, ripping took something like 4-5 min's, and the total burn time, at 4X DVD+R (the free blank disk that comes packaged) was 14:01. Not too shabby. If I am not mistaken, Spaceballs is in total just a wee bit over 4.5GB. Now I need some 8X DVD+R's!!! Assuming I had an 8X disk and burned at said speed, I would obviously assume it would burn in or around 7 minutes. *AWESOME!*

P.S. I know this is slightly off topic, but if anyone could share their 2 cents on what the best method, or DVD ripper, would be, I would greatly appreciate that. Again, I am a n00b at this, so bare w/ me, yet I would like to continue sharing my results of the burning process.
Thanks.

by **Dartman** on Sun Dec 28, 2003 7:10 pm

Try http://www.vcdhelp.com and poke around. they have all kinds of info and links that should help you out.

by **dodecahedron** on Sun Dec 28, 2003 7:34 pm

Dartman wrote:Try http://www.vcdhelp.com and poke around. they have all kinds of info and links that should help you out.

they're called www.dvdrhelp.com now

by **Dartman** on Sun Dec 28, 2003 7:39 pm

OH FINE, NYAAAA.....

by **dodecahedron** on Sun Dec 28, 2003 7:40 pm

by **Rockymaru** on Sun Dec 28, 2003 8:41 pm

Ahhhhh, yes. VCDHelp. Forgot about them. So I see they're now DVDRhelp...cool

I'll check it out.

Thanks, guys.

by **Rockymaru** on Tue Dec 30, 2003 5:06 pm

Just purchased a DVD+R 25 pack spindle of Memorex 4X at Amazon for only $25.49 (~$30 shipped). It has shipped today and I will notify you guys when I receive them and how they burn (and if they can burn at 8X).

by **Dartman** on Tue Dec 30, 2003 5:17 pm

The Memorex media is very problematic. one spindle will be the best stuff you ever tried, the next form the same manufacturer will be crap so it's kinda a lottery with those. They also use several different makers so you never know from batch to batch. Hopefully you'll get some of the first quality Ricohs they get instead of the seconds. Also our drive's may be a bit more forgiving of bad media, maybe not.

by **aviationwiz** on Tue Dec 30, 2003 6:59 pm

Rockymaru wrote:Anyways, ripping took something like 4-5 min's, and the total burn time, at 4X DVD+R (the free blank disk that comes packaged) was 14:01. Not too shabby. If I am not mistaken, Spaceballs is in total just a wee bit over 4.5GB. Now I need some 8X DVD+R's!!! Assuming I had an 8X disk and burned at said speed, I would obviously assume it would burn in or around 7 minutes.

Actually,

It would take roughly somewhere between 8 and 8 and a half minutes, because it doesn't write at 8x throughout the whole disk.

by **Rockymaru** on Tue Dec 30, 2003 9:47 pm

Dartman wrote:The Memorex media is very problematic. one spindle will be the best stuff you ever tried, the next form the same manufacturer will be crap so it's kinda a lottery with those. They also use several different makers so you never know from batch to batch. Hopefully you'll get some of the first quality Ricohs they get instead of the seconds. Also our drive's may be a bit more forgiving of bad media, maybe not.

I knew I was taking a risk. I was hoping they would, indeed, turn out to be Richohs, as I've read some were. But again, only $30 for 25 DVD+Rs. If half of them are bad, I will have lot of coasters

Or I could trade them to my friend to see if what he has is good in return to see if Memorex is good for him.

aviationwiz wrote:Actually,

It would take roughly somewhere between 8 and 8 and a half minutes, because it doesn't write at 8x throughout the whole disk.

Thank you for the correction. I was just under the assumption that since a 4X took 14 minutes, an 8X (2x's faster) would take 1/2 the time.

by **Rockymaru** on Fri Jan 02, 2004 7:21 pm

Hey guys, Rocky here to bring you an update on the Memorex media. Well, I have some good news and great news. Good news is burned Jaws (after shrinking it from DVD9 to DVD5) successfully, as well as Return of the Living Dead (a DVD5). The Return of the Living Dead backup is most impressive, actually. It made a 100% backup copy in 10 min's at 4x (it was only about 3.3Gig's if I recall correctly, and not 4). Here's the great news: Jaws only took 7 min's at 8x!! Therefore, 8x is definitely compatible w/ the Memorex spindle I bought, even though it's labeled as 4x.

For those interested in buying 'em, here's the link:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/ ... 23-0774521
Note: I purchased it from the top Amazon merchant, the one selling it for $25.49, and not directly from Amazon.

by **Dartman** on Fri Jan 02, 2004 7:32 pm

Well looks like you got lucky in the lottery then. Hard to say if your next batch will work OK or not. You might want to run some K probe scans on it and see how it looks. I've had some really bad looking ones work fine so I guess as long as they play it's all right anyways.

by **Rockymaru** on Sat Jan 03, 2004 2:15 am

Back w/ more results. While Jaws did, indeed, take around 7 minutes to burn at 8x, some have taken as long as 10 minutes. Could this possibly mean that some are burning at 6x?

Otherwise, I have yet to burn a coaster. Only problem I've faced is that it can't overburn like CDs (I had to remove a 30 meg trailer from a DVD just to get it to work). I guess most of you longtime members already know that, huh?

Here are the results of the backups I've made of my collection (DVD9s shrunk using DVD2One). All of them are either very, very close to the 4,500MB cut-off limit or within 100MB and burned at 8x using latest version of Nero with, of course, my trusty Memorex 4x's

:
1. Croutching Tiger Hidden Dragon: Removed 1 30MB trailer + French audio. Total time=10:37
2. a) Gladiator disk 1: Removed 2.0 and 5.1 surround sound files (kept commentary and DTS 6.1

). Total time=8:47
b) Gladiator disk 2: (From 6.6GB to 4.45GB) Nothing removed. Total time=9:25
3. Mission Impossible 2: DVD-ROM contents removed. Total time=8:37

by **Dartman** on Sat Jan 03, 2004 4:19 am

If it's taking 10 minutes you might be hitting the buffer a bit or like you said it dropped speed or didn't upshift right away. Many of us use Nero and there is a mod to make it show actual write speed while burning, which is very handy for seeing what is really going on during the burn. Mine usually starts at 6x then upshifts somewhere in the burn to 8x if everythings going right.
Sometimes it starts at 4x for a tiny bit but mostly 6x to 8. Actual speed is 5.9 to 7.9 with a bit of up down float as it writes.
All I know is it was a thrill to get away with a burn on the flyat 8x in under 8 minutes and never hit the buffer once except for the 6 to 8 upshift. Unfortunately it was too fast for the media and didn't work

That was a single layer disk so it read faster then a dual will.

by **Rockymaru** on Sat Jan 03, 2004 3:56 pm

Dartman wrote:If it's taking 10 minutes you might be hitting the buffer a bit or like you said it dropped speed or didn't upshift right away.

Yeah, what's funny is I *DID* hear a difference when backing up certain movies. Sometimes it seemed neutral, other times it would be slightly noisier, obviously meaning it was upshifting or gaining speed.
And when you say it may be "hitting the buffer," does that mean the LiteOn is taking a heavy load?

Many of us use Nero and there is a mod to make it show actual write speed while burning, which is very handy for seeing what is really going on during the burn. Mine usually starts at 6x then upshifts somewhere in the burn to 8x if everythings going right.
Sometimes it starts at 4x for a tiny bit but mostly 6x to 8. Actual speed is 5.9 to 7.9 with a bit of up down float as it writes.
All I know is it was a thrill to get away with a burn on the flyat 8x in under 8 minutes and never hit the buffer once except for the 6 to 8 upshift. Unfortunately it was too fast for the media and didn't work That was a single layer disk so it read faster then a dual will.

This mod sounds interesting. I've never read about it at DVDRHelp or Doom9 or elsewhere. Is it a safe modification to Nero? Or should I say, is it LEGIT and legal? LOL.

by **Dartman** on Sat Jan 03, 2004 4:23 pm

I believe there is a thread on the forum somewhere that tells you what to do. it just adds a couple of thing to the registry to make it also display actual speed and as far as I know that's not illegal or anything just a home grown improvement that should be in Nero to begin with.
If you hit the boffer under run protection it just means the drive has to stop and wait for the info to fill the buffer before it can continue and it slows the burn down and MIGHT add extra errors. Your system wasn't feeding it fast enough for whatever reason or like you said maybe it was really doing 6x even though Nero claimed 8x, another reason for the show speed mod. I'll look around here and see if I can find the thread and add the link to it. http://www.cdrlabs.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=12120

LiteOn 811S Burn "review"

LiteOn 811S Burn "review"

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