Benq FW-Support? Not so good like many people thought?

[Scour]

Hello!

Benq´s FW-support was in the past respected from many users, some people think it´s better than the FW-support from Plextor. But now I saw that the FW-support for the 1620 and 1620 Pro was almost dead (don´t talk about the popular DW800 which seems to be real dead). The last update for the 1620 was in February, for the Pro in April. But there are some new media on the way, some avaible that the Benq´s don´t support.

I was shocked when I saw that the Sony 16D1, one of the first 16 DVD-R was only supported @8x and the writing-quality isn´t good for 8x:

http://apparat.ap.funpic.de/viewtopic.php?p=3429#3429

So what do you think? Does Benq only support the newest drives or will they release some new FW for older drives?

[dodecahedron]

i don't understand how you say that, the 1620 and 1620 pro are the same drive and have the same firmwares
1620/1620Pro firmware download @ BenQ support
anyway, is any other company better at firmware updates on old drives ?

[Ian]

Pioneer, Plextor and Lite-On tend to release updates for their older drives. However, once those drives are a few generations behind though, they seem to stop too.

[Dartman]

They just released yesterday a firmware upgrade/fix after the first solid burn 1640 version had some major problems, original release was the 15th.
The 1600/1620/1620 pro had a release a month for quite a while, most adding free upgrades and improving quality of burns. The 1620 is pretty much mature now, I have 2 and am very happy with them, the new 1640 seems to be following the same path.
NEC hardly releases any firmware, most of LiteOn's DVD burners only work fair to poor even with firmware support, Pioneer does pretty well, but I think BenQ seems to be the most all around responsive right now, they keep adding software that helps their dives do more for their users too.
I think once a drive is off the shelfs for a while everyone kinda moves on, most geeks upgrade to the next great thing way before the last great thing wears out anyways. If your worried about a older drive e-mail support and see if they plan on any more releases to keep up with new media.
I also have a 811, a 2500, 3500, and a new 1640 that works great with the new L/fixed firmware. The 2 NEC drives always worked well even before adding any hacks, the 811 sucked and is only good as a cd burner and test unit.

[Scour]

@dodecahedron

I know that (1600)1620 and Pro are identical, but that wasn´t so from the beginning , only when you crossflash you can make a 1620 to a Pro.
And the last FW for the 1620 is from 2/2005.

@Ian

Plextor sells since 12/2004 the 716, but FW for the much older products like 708 and 712 is much newer than the Benq-releases for the newer drives. The time will sure come that Plextor stopped the FW-support for the older drives, but the competitors stop the FW-support much earlier.

@Dartman:

The 1640 is the newest Benq and is (in the moment) well supported. But I don´t found a FW-update for 1620/1620 Pro that was from last month.

I don´t want to say that Benq is worse with FW-support, manufacturers like NEC and LG had a bad FW-support. But it looks like that Benq forget the not actual drives much faster than most users think.

[dodecahedron]

I know that (1600)1620 and Pro are identical, but that wasn´t so from the beginning , only when you crossflash you can make a 1620 to a Pro.
And the last FW for the 1620 is from 2/2005.

i'm sorry, i still think you are wrong.
the 1620 and 1620Pro are identical drives, the only difference is the Retail Package and software bundle.
you cannot "make" a 1620 into a 1620Pro. AFAIK they're both recognized by BIOS etc. as BENQ DVD DD DW1620.
@ BenQ's support site, the firmware page for 1620 and 1620Pro is the same page. hereit is.
you say the last update for 1620 is Feb 2005 and the last update for 1620Pro is April 2005.
if you look at that page you see that April 2005 is B7V9, and that's for 1620 and 1620Pro too.

in any case, this argument is moot.
i agree with you that it seems that Plextor supports older drives longer than BenQ.

[Scour]

i'm sorry, i still think you are wrong.
the 1620 and 1620Pro are identical drives, the only difference is the Retail Package and software bundle.
you cannot "make" a 1620 into a 1620Pro. AFAIK they're both recognized by BIOS etc. as BENQ DVD DD DW1620.

Maybe I´m wrong, but I´m sure I read in the german Brennmeister-Forum about that. To make the confusion complete:

http://cdr.cz/dvd_rekordery/benq/dw1620a.html

http://cdr.cz/dvd_rekordery/benq/dw1620pro.html

[RJW]

People don't forget plextor and the cactus data shield incident.
When the first cactus protected cd's showed up Plextor decided to release all firmwares to fix this one on there complete back catalogue if was possible that included drives which didn't see releases for more then a whole year.

About Benq I think they should focus a bit more on support of the 1620 afterall the 1640 now has solid burn so it can fine tune itself.

[dodecahedron]

http://cdr.cz/dvd_rekordery/benq/dw1620a.html

http://cdr.cz/dvd_rekordery/benq/dw1620pro.html

yes and if you go there you see that they have the same firmwares.
the latest is B7V9 and it's the same link in both pages.

[Scour]

yes and if you go there you see that they have the same firmwares.
the latest is B7V9 and it's the same link in both pages.

OK, you´re right.

But to come back to the topic, I remember that Benq brings in the beginning every month a new FW for the 16xx-drives, but now they only focussing on the 1640 and 1625. Maybe the same happens to these 2 drives when the new Benq´s are on the sale.

[RJW]

Point is if SOLID BURN works as it should work then they don't need to be hat fast with releasing updates for the 1640.
Also do not forget that the 1640 supports allready much media you probally won't see for months. Also is supports some really small manufacturers which I was quites suprised to see supported and at full speed.

[Scour]

Point is if SOLID BURN works as it should work then they don't need to be hat fast with releasing updates for the 1640.
Also do not forget that the 1640 supports allready much media you probally won't see for months. Also is supports some really small manufacturers which I was quites suprised to see supported and at full speed.

That´s a point. Solidburn could be compensate a lack of FW-support.

I wish taht some other manufacturers like LG and NEC do the same.

[ala42]

I was shocked when I saw that the Sony 16D1, one of the first 16 DVD-R was only supported @8x and the writing-quality isn´t good for 8x:

http://apparat.ap.funpic.de/viewtopic.php?p=3429#3429

So what do you think? Does Benq only support the newest drives or will they release some new FW for older drives?

I think your information is incorrect. Even SONY08D1 is supported at 16x, so is SONY16D1. Have a look here or here.

[Scour]

I think your information is incorrect. Even SONY08D1 is supported at 16x, so is SONY16D1. Have a look here or here.

Maybe depends on the FW? He use B7V9, your posts show B7U9 and B7T9.

[thegdog]

So what do you think? Does Benq only support the newest drives or will they release some new FW for older drives?

I think the important question is "Is there a need to release new firmware?"

You mention support for certain drives that is now dead. But if the writing quality is good, then is there a need for new firmware? The BenQ 1620 appears to have very good writing capabilities. If there is a major new piece of media that is released that needs a firmware update to support, I could understand a new release. But just because firmware hasn't been released in a while isn't necessarily a bad thing.

From the short amount of time that I had my Pioneer DVR-A09, I tried a bunch of 16x discs only to have the Pioneer top out writing most of them at 12x. Yet the BenQ 1620 -- with a firmware like 5, 6, 7 months old -- writes several more at 16x. And does it well. So does the fact that Pioneer just released a new firmware mean they are supporting their drives better than BenQ? I'd have to disagree with conclusion.

[thegdog]

I was shocked when I saw that the Sony 16D1, one of the first 16 DVD-R was only supported @8x and the writing-quality isn´t good for 8x

The quality score is a 94 for a disc scanned at 8x and that's not that good? Come on.

And according to MediaCodeSpeedEdit, the B7V9 firmware for the 1620 supports Sony 16D1 media at 16x. In fact, the B7L9 firmware released in October 2004 supported it at 16x as well. (Older firmwares may also have supported it but B7L9 is the first revision that MCSE will let me open to check.) So not sure where you came to the conclusion that it only was supported at 8x.

[Scour]

@thegdog

QS 94 is not what I like to see with high-quality 16x-media when writing @8x (my opinion).

The user from the scan I posted said that there´s now higher speed than 8x possible.

The fact is, that many manufacturers will bring next time some new 16x-media, which is maybe (or sure) not included in the actual Benq 1620-FW. And nobody knows whether Benq will bring new FW for the 1620 to support these newer media.

When you take a look at the older Benq from the 8xx-series you see that Benq does not support it anymore, on the other hand Plextor brought last month a new FW for their old 8x4x-writer 708.

[thegdog]

QS 94 is not what I like to see with high-quality 16x-media when writing @8x (my opinion).

I don't necessarily consider Sony "high-quality" in general, but even still, my belief is that a 94 score is pretty darn good - albeit on a test that might not really mean anything valid anyway.

The user from the scan I posted said that there´s now higher speed than 8x possible.

Don't know what to tell you there. That user would appear to be wrong. Looking at the firmware in MCSE shows 16x. Other people have burned it at 16x. Maybe this user has a problem on his system. Hypothetically, that could also have contributed that bad burn.

The fact is, that many manufacturers will bring next time some new 16x-media, which is maybe (or sure) not included in the actual Benq 1620-FW. And nobody knows whether Benq will bring new FW for the 1620 to support these newer media.

Again, as I said, if there is new 16x media available, then I could understand needing a new firmware release so that the drive supports that media. But... while I don't spend a whole lot of time reading all the forms, I haven't seen an outcry from BenQ 1620 users that they can't burn certain 16x media at that speed.

Not to mention, that thanks to ala42, we have a great tool in MCSE so that even if there was one, we could try to take care of it on our own. We can't do that with Plextor or Pioneer. And I can only compare to the Pioneer I briefly had, the BenQ drives support more media at 16x in firmware that's 7 months old than the Pionner DVR-109 whose firmware was just released a few weeks ago.

So it is all relative.

[Scour]

I don't necessarily consider Sony "high-quality" in general, but even still, my belief is that a 94 score is pretty darn good - albeit on a test that might not really mean anything valid anyway.

So it is all relative.

With the last sentence you´re right

I don´t want to compare Sony with TY, but Sony-media is one of the most compatible media you can get. My LG 4082 don´t love all 8x-media and wrote them @8x, but Sony 8x DVD-R and +R runs real good in my drive.

[Gabe]

I talked to the guy that do the Sony 16D1-burns. He said that he could selcet 16x or 12x with some 16x DVD-R, but the Benq burned only @8x.