Sony DRX-500UL / Firmware Question

[lightningbaron]

This is a question for anyone that has a Sony DRX-500UL or Sony DRU-500A, has their been any benefits going from firmware 1.0d to 1.0f besides Sony claiming the following:

"This new firmware will allow your Dual RW drive to record at 4X on 4X compatible DVD+R media as well as improve the DVD-ROM reading performance with DVD recordable/rewritable media."

To my surprise, my Sony DRX-500UL has a manufacture date of December 2002 and arriving with firmware 1.0d.

Afterall, it's still relatively difficult to find DVD+R media rated 4x.

What is the downside of staying with 1.0d?

Thank you all in advance for any insight into the inquiry.

[VEFF]

1.0f allows several brands/types of 1X rated DVD-Rs to be burned at 2X (Haven't tried those brands/types yet myself, since I still had blanks).

1.0f also improves write quality, so that some cheap brands that caused some people problems before can now be burned successfully.

Definitely worth the upgrade, besides the fact that it adds 4X DVD+R write support.

[Kennyshin]

There are already 4x DVD+R media from two Japanese media companies, Mitsubishi Chemical's Verbatim and TDK. $6.5 and $6.0. Ritek 4x DVD+R media will begin to be shipped from as early as Jan 2003.

I'd like to use the "100x stronger" TDK DVD-R and 4x Taiyo Yuden DVD-R. Both a little over $2.5 per disk in the Japanese market. They will surely also make DVD+R versions of those new media later.

[lightningbaron]

VEFF - Thank you the info on the firmware. I guess I'll be taking the dive too!

Kennyshin - Thank you for the info on the media. Hopefully, we'll see more 4x DVD media out there in the near future!

[boblx2]

lightningbaron, why don't you try burning 4X media before you upgrade to 1.0f. You can always upgrade it if it don't work. I have had more then one post from another forum that suggested that I downgrade my firmware to 1.0d in order to burn Ritek 4X (probably the most popular 4X media) on the Sony DRU-500A. It won't cost you anything to try it except maybe one disc. I have mine already upgraded to 1.0f and it will not burn the Ritek discs at 4X. I am thinking of downgrading (according to the post this is not a problem) to 1.0d to try the Ritek media. But I really hate messing with firmware I have heard too many horror stories about wrecking drives. It is not worth that since the Sony works perfectly at 2X -R and 2.4X for +R. You can get a pretty good deal on Ritek 4X media at Hyper microsystems. They are selling it at less then $2.00 per disc in lots of 10. But if your Sony won't burn it then it is a waste of money. Luckily I also have a Pioneer A05 which works fine with that media so it was not wasted.

Good luck with it however you approach it.......

[vdepina]

I tried to upgrade from 1c to 1f it does not work, but i am happy with the drive cause i have copied the entire movie with DVDxcopy, great program
great program great drive from sony, thanks

i recomend everyone in the USA to get one Sony DRX500UL

[lightningbaron]

boblx2 - Thank you for the information regarding the Ritek 4x media. I like hypermicro.com also. Unfortunately, I took the plunge already to 1.0f. It seems that DVD-R media at 4x is already out and DVD+R media at 4x is not out yet.

[donpedro]

If I am not mistaken.... 1.0f allows 4x for +R. 4x for -R was there even before.... am I right ?

[boblx2]

Yes you are right. I don't know why the suggestion was made to down grade in order to burn Ritek 4X. I can't believe they would remove compatibility. I haven't tried it yet. Since my A05 burns Ritek 4X perfectly I am not motivated to mess around with the Sony as of yet.

........

[mjwaldschm]

My DRX500UL will not burn at all after installing the firmware update from the Sony website. I get the following error message:

"Could not complete last command because: Stream not initialized (DVDErr, -19930)"