Verbatim Datalife Plus + Lite-On = Recipe for disaster?

[Bhairav]

Hey. I read over at cdfreaks that when you write to Verbatim Datalife Plus
CD-Rs, the resulting burn is not very good? Apparently, they write better in other writers, but Lite-Ons have problems with them?
Can anyone confirm/refute this? I just ordered a cake of the Verbatims, because we don't get Taiyo Yuden here in India.
Please check this out guys.
Thanks
Bhairav

[mred]

Not sure what they are talking about. I have used Verbatims for years in several different brand burners; Plextor, Yamaha and 2 different LiteOn burners. The first LiteOn was the 40/12/48 which I used Verbatims 32X CDR's and often burned them at 40X, also used their 10X rated CD-RW and burned them at 12X without 1 single problem with either. Both also read fine in other machines.

I now have LiteOn's 52/24/52 and I am stil sticking with Verbatim. I am using their 48X CDR's and their 24X CD-RW's and again buring at all different speeds including 52X on the 48X rated and again have yet to have a single failure.

I would not be affraid to use them in a LiteOn machine or any other for that matter as I think they are one of the best media out there.

[Spazmogen]

With a LTR-52246S (52x24x52x)

Fuji 48x (Taiyo Yuden) burned @ 52x:



Verbatim 48x DataLifePlus (Super Azo) burned @ 52x


The Verbatim disc is only slightly worse than the Fuji.

I've never had a problem with the Verbatim discs. Mine are "Made in Mexico", which someone pointed out may be the old Kodak plant.


Now slow the burn down to 48x and here's the results:

Fuji:



Verbatim:


Conclusion: Fuji (Taiyo Yuden) are better @ 52x than the Verbatim discs, but the Verbatims are still respectable.

[Bhairav]

Heh.. thanks for the replies guys. Yeah.. I got the cake of cds today,and let's say that I have had my cake and eaten it too
I have got good burns with them, and will try to post images of wses or CDDoctor scans.
Thanks again
Bhairav

[BillyG]

Spaz - did you upgrade your Lite-On to the latest Bios??

I read on another board (cant remember which one) that the latest Bios for the Lite-On for the 48125W drives improves burns on Verbatim CD-R's.

The thing I hated most about older Verbatim DataLife's is that lousy top coating they used, if it gets wet it can peel right off.

And if your hands are greasy the oil from your fingers shows up well - so dont eat potato chips and handle these CD-R's!

[Spazmogen]

Spaz - did you upgrade your Lite-On to the latest Bios??

I read on another board (cant remember which one) that the latest Bios for the Lite-On for the 48125W drives improves burns on Verbatim CD-R's.

The thing I hated most about older Verbatim DataLife's is that lousy top coating they used, if it gets wet it can peel right off.

And if your hands are greasy the oil from your fingers shows up well - so dont eat potato chips and handle these CD-R's!

I'm running the latest firmware (6S0C) for the LTR-52246S.

Thanks for the tip about greasy fingers.

[cfitz]

And if your hands are greasy the oil from your fingers shows up well - so dont eat potato chips and handle these CD-R's!

Heathen! How could you even think about treating your optical discs so badly? Keep it up and we will have to send the CD-welfare police over to your place, have them seize your CDs, and put them into foster care.

cfitz

[BuddhaTB]

I was wondering, is it possible to get zero C1 errors when checking a burned CD?

[cfitz]

That would be extremely unlikely. Of course it is theoretically possible to make a "perfect" disc, but don't look to get one out your PC's drive.

cfitz

[Bhairav]

Hey all.. I burnt a couple of Verbatim DataLife Plus CDs (16X)which I purchased. The ATIP is as below:

ATIP: 97m 34s 21f
Disc Manufacturer: Mitsubishi Chemicals Corp.
Reflective layer: Dye (Long strategy; e.g. Cyanine, Azo etc.)
Media type: CD-Recordable
Recording Speeds: min. unknown - max. unknown
nominal Capacity: 702.83MB (79m 59s 74f / LBA: 359849)

The underside of the CD is blue.. deep blue in colour.

The problem is that when burning at 32X (which is the Smart Burn limit), there are LOADS of C2 errors at the beginning of the drive, which can't be good. If anyone has any free webspace up, lemme know, and I will try to send you the CDDoctor scans.

Any ideas? I will try to reduce the burn speed and report back here.

Thanks
Bhairav

[dodecahedron]

then burn them at 16x.
if you check out the media compatibility table http://www.cdrlabs.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=6005 you will see that most Lite-Ons dont burn Verbatim DataLifePlus media at faster than their rating.

[Bhairav]

All right, I give up with these damn discs. I have tried to burn them at all speeds from 8X to 32X, always getting a huge number of C2 errors at the beginning and the end. I noticed that the same thing happened whether I burnt with TAO or DAO. What should I do? I finally thought that I had got good media here in India, and now this!
Is it worth giving it a try with OEM Lite-On firmware (eg Sony and Memorex) ?

[BillyG]

Heathen! How could you even think about treating your optical discs so badly? Keep it up and we will have to send the CD-welfare police over to your place, have them seize your CDs, and put them into foster care.

cfitz

LOL! Yeah Im a CD-R abuser, You should see the way I treat crappy CMC and Lead Data CD-R's in the car - fingerprints over them, leaving them on the car seat without cases so I can swap them out easily. I treat them worse than I ever did cassettes!

At least I keep them in a slipcase when Im not driving. I have seen guys treat CD-R like coasters or ashtrays, and they wonder why they dont play anymore?

I keep my precious Tayio Udens at home.

[cfitz]

LOL! Yeah Im a CD-R abuser, You should see the way I treat crappy CMC and Lead Data CD-R's in the car - fingerprints over them, leaving them on the car seat without cases so I can swap them out easily. I treat them worse than I ever did cassettes!

Well, I am sure you are not alone. That is one of the excellent arguments for "fair use" copying of audio CDs. CDs do get abused in many environments, so it makes good sense to copy to CD-R for daily use and to leave the originals in a safe place at home. Then if (or more likely when) something bad happens to a CD, you can just burn a new copy. Too bad the RIAA doesn't see it that way.

cfitz

[Dartman]

The Lite Ons wont write properly to the dark blue disks. I have those old TDK certified + 12x and they wont write at all in any of my Lite On based drives. I think becuase the dark dye is pretty much dead now so they never updated the burn table for that dye.
My old Plex 12x4x32 would do them of course and my TDK 24 did them OK at around 20 speed.
The Sony dru500a I just got will burn them clean at it's max speed if you were thinking of getting a DVD burner some day.
I did get a fairly clean burn once by disabling Smart Burn and going 48x, it wasn't perfect but much better then I normaly got with the drive.

[Bhairav]

No... no go. I tried a 52X DAO burn, came out horrible. A 16X Dao burn on the other hand was comparatively better, in that there were no C2 errors, but loads of C1 errors (550 average, according to CDDoctor)
I'm going to try OEM LiteOn firmwares, in the hope that recording quality is better using them, rather than original LiteOn firmware.

[Dartman]

I think you'll probably end up just not using the media. I wasn't till this dvd burner I just got turned out to be OK with it. It had like 10 max a .045 average with the media which is just slightly worse then my 52 does with the Fuji/TY media it likes.
The 52 does just as bad as yours with the TDK stuff I have and even slowing it down doesn't seem to help at all.

[Bhairav]

Damn.Thanks for the follow-up, Dartman.
Does anyone with an OEM LiteOn 6 series drive have a good experience with these discs? By OEM I mean a company like TDK,Memorex or Sony, who apply their own firmware to the LiteOn drive. If you have had a good experience with them, do add your thoughts to this thread.
Thanks
Bhairav