Has the Average Person Heard Of Lite-On?

by **aviationwiz** on Tue Jun 24, 2003 3:23 pm

Do you think the average person walking into a retail store like Best Buy going to buy a burner has heard of Lite-On?

by **dodecahedron** on Tue Jun 24, 2003 3:25 pm

hey aviationwiz, you put up this poll exactly a couple of days ago and then deleted it before i (or anyone else) could answer.

what's up ???

by **aviationwiz** on Tue Jun 24, 2003 3:30 pm

I dunno, I just decided to take it down. Now, come out with it.

What were you going to say? All of you.

by **jmbrown12** on Tue Jun 24, 2003 3:42 pm

No, the same way the average customer has probably never heard of Plextor or Yamaha (isn't that a motorcycle?). My retail sales experience leads me to believe that the majority of customers look for (a) cheapest, (b) most expensive (must be better), (c) brand recognition ("this is a Sony so it must be good), or (d) asks for a recommendation.

by **aviationwiz** on Tue Jun 24, 2003 3:50 pm

Well, I would certaintly say that average people have heard of Plextor and Yamaha more than Lite-On. The average user probably knows these brands the best:

Sony
Memorex
Verbatim
Cen-Dyne

Notice how not one of those companies makes thier own CD Burners.

by **MonteLDS** on Tue Jun 24, 2003 3:53 pm

i really doubt people know cause they go with names they trust like Sony. Although Sony is just using a Lite-On Drive most people might not understand what OEM really is. Or for the larger part i doubt most of them care; as long as it works right

by **dhc014** on Tue Jun 24, 2003 4:16 pm

The other day I recommended a Memorex 52x burner to someone who I saw walking around with a Sony 52x burner and I proceeded to explain how they are the exact same hardware, but the Sony costs more and comes with worse software and a limiting firmware. He had never heard of Lite-ON though he seemed to know a little about computer hardware.

by **Justin42** on Tue Jun 24, 2003 4:35 pm

This kinda speaks to an issue I was talking about with someone the other day-- should companies, who only blatantly re-brand products and re-sell them, be required to somehow label who ACTUALLY made the drive? Like "Made in Japan by LiteOn" (or wherever, it's just an example) so there's a chance of people understanding this?

Sure, the big companies would be totally against it-- I'm just wondering if people think something like this would be understood by the average consumer.

by **aviationwiz** on Tue Jun 24, 2003 4:57 pm

I don't think the average person would understand that at all. It would be better for companies like Lite-On to just sell thier drives to Best Buy and Comp USA and stores like that directly.

by **aviationwiz** on Tue Jun 24, 2003 4:58 pm

I remember telling someone at Best Buy who asked me what DVD Burner they should get, they were going to get the HP 200i, but I told them to get the Memorex one instead because it was the same drive, and it was a lot cheaper.

by **David** on Tue Jun 24, 2003 5:50 pm

I would have to agree with jmbrown12 most people that I see buy whichever drive is on sale that week.

by **Dartman** on Tue Jun 24, 2003 6:48 pm

I had a TDK 24x10x40 but it wasn't the Liteon one. I wanted a do it all drive that would fully work with Clone and do as much as possible. I have had a Yamaha 4260, a Cendyne 12x which was a Sanyo, a Plextor 12X4X32 after I blew up the Cendyne

, The TDK then a bunch of Buslink/Liteon drives. All of the earlier drives couldn't do things I wanted to do after I paid big money for them, except for the TDK, it was cheap.
So I did some homework here and at CDRinfo and anywhere else I could find and the Liteon brand kept popping up as the be all end all drive and they were cheap to buy too

I bought a 32X in a Buslink box becuase all the specs matched the Liteon and it indeed was one when I opened the box. I have steadily upgraded since as faster cheaper ones came out. I even finally dumped my Plex 40 wide reader because the Liteon 166s DVD drive is faster and can do pretty much anything the Plex could, plus the door on the Plex was always hanging up just before it would close.
I will always let a confusee customer know about the Liteon type reboxed drives if I'm there and see them trying to make up their mind.

by **BillyG** on Tue Jun 24, 2003 8:07 pm

I think Lite-On should run some magazine ads (in magazines like Maximum PC) like Plextor has done instead of relying on reviews. It's a good thing that "Word of Mouth" advertising via the internet has worked for them.

I bet most people who have built a PC or upgraded thier CD-RW drive have a Lite-On now and dont even know it.

by **BoGMan1a** on Wed Jun 25, 2003 12:38 am

I don't know if I want them famous :evil:

, I think I prefer Liteon lean and hungry. As major OEM players (I am sure that they sell 2 or 3 OEM units to every Liteon badged unit) they have to keep their technology fresh, cutting edge, and cost-effective or risk being nudged out of their niche in the market. Guess who benefits?

by **CDRecorder** on Wed Jun 25, 2003 4:46 pm

I don't think most people have heard of any of the actual manufacturers of these drives such as Lite-On, AOpen, Sanyo, etc.

by **burninfool** on Wed Jun 25, 2003 4:58 pm

LiteOnGuy wrote:I don't think most people have heard of any of the actual manufacturers of these drives such as Lite-On, AOpen, Sanyo, etc.

Exactly,that's why they label them with known names such as TDK,Verbatim or Memorex.Most computer shoppers are pretty savvy(at least the ones I know) nowadays and do some research into products before buying.

by **BillyG** on Wed Jun 25, 2003 5:09 pm

BoGMan1a wrote:I don't know if I want them famous , I think I prefer Liteon lean and hungry. As major OEM players (I am sure that they sell 2 or 3 OEM units to every Liteon badged unit) they have to keep their technology fresh, cutting edge, and cost-effective or risk being nudged out of their niche in the market. Guess who benefits?

I understand your point - I guess like most OEM companies they're conforable in thier nitche and dont want more attention. Perhaps if more people bought more Lite-On drives instead of the ones they manufacture for Sony, TDK, etc it would hurt them in the long run.

But I know people in my computer users group who bought some off-brand CD-Rom drive and had a lot of problems with media incompatiblity, and I have always thought "if they'd had only bought a Lite-On".

I hope Lite-On stays on the cutting edge since CD-R technology has been maxxed out to all it can do and now the attention is moving over to DVD-Rom drives.

by **Action Jackson** on Wed Jun 25, 2003 7:40 pm

Probably not but it depends on what the definition of "average" is.

by **TheWizard** on Thu Jun 26, 2003 7:10 pm

Action Jackson wrote:Probably not but it depends on what the definition of "average" is.

And how!

by **Kennyshin** on Sun Jun 29, 2003 3:08 am

BoGMan1a wrote:I don't know if I want them famous , I think I prefer Liteon lean and hungry. As major OEM players (I am sure that they sell 2 or 3 OEM units to every Liteon badged unit) they have to keep their technology fresh, cutting edge, and cost-effective or risk being nudged out of their niche in the market. Guess who benefits?

They are not hungry. Lite-On IT makes 20% profits. Ritek has also made great success in the media market.

It's rather Sony that is hungry and wants new and profitable markets.

by **jase** on Wed Jul 09, 2003 8:59 am

LiteOnGuy wrote:I don't think most people have heard of any of the actual manufacturers of these drives such as Lite-On, AOpen, Sanyo, etc.

LiteOn, Aopen, sure. But Sanyo? Surely everyone's heard of them. Like a whole bunch of Japanese companies (Mitsubishi, Akai, Aiwa, Hitachi) they do everything Sony/Panasonic/Tosh do, just as well made and a fair bit cheaper.....

by **CDRecorder** on Wed Jul 09, 2003 2:32 pm

Good point; Sanyo is probably more familiar to most people than Lite-On or AOpen.