Official K-Probe Discussion (Tool for Scanning C1C2/PIPO)

[MediumRare]

I have what is apparently a "CD-Extra" with 2 sessions. The first session contains 18 audio tracks, the second session a "bonus video". The windows explorer shows just the second session. Other tools (Nero CDDAE, EAC, Nero itself, the Japanese digitalcdplayer dcdp_r107, etc.) have no problems in displaying the entire contents.

I tried to scan this disk with KProbe. The disk information option listed all tracks and both sessions. A C1/C2 scan however, looked at the first minute or so and then jumped to the second session. Has anyone else tried scanning this type of disk?

I tried a scan with CD-Doctor and the Doctor examined the health of the entire disk as expected.

G

[CDRecorder]

I burned a CD-Extra disc with 3 audio tracks in the first session and a single data track in the second session, and the same thing happened. The place where KProbe "jumped" to the second session was in the middle of the first track in the first session. BTW, I am using KProbe 1.1.26.

I also ran CDSpeed Scandisc on this disc, and it scanned the entire disc. However, it displayed millions of C2 errors in the middle of the disc; I assume that was the area between the two sessions.

[MediumRare]

I also ran CDSpeed Scandisc on this disc, and it scanned the entire disc. However, it displayed millions of C2 errors in the middle of the disc; I assume that was the area between the two sessions.

I tried a surface scan with CD-Speed too, but the results were different from yours- no errors but a large group of unused blocks between the sessions. This wasn't a compilation I made myself, though, but a scan of the pressed CD and a backup copy.

I also tried various older versions of KProbe- no difference.

What does CD Doctor show for your disk?

G

[CDRecorder]

I actually didn't do the Surface Scan for my last post: I used the "CD Quality Check" feature; I mistakenly wrote "scandisc" in my last post.

I had erased my test disc, but I made a new one on an old CD-RW disc. I tested it with CDSpeed CD Quality Scan (same result as before) and KProbe (same result as before). I then scanned it with CDSpeed Scandisc, and got the same result for the surface scan as you did.

I then scanned it in CD Doctor, and I got this result:



The "blank" spot seems to be the transition between the audio tracks and the data track. There are almost exactly 10 minutes of audio on the disc, and there is almost exactly 10MB of data in the data track.

[dolphinius_rex]

So since I now have a LiteON 401S drive, I thought I'd start doing testing on my DVDs to see their various qualities. So my first idea was to find some sort of an acceptable standard, to see what kind of error rates were ok, and what was too much. So I popped in a DVD-R that was burned for me by a friend, that would only play about half way through since the quality of the disc was so poor! So I scanned it, and saw an average PO of over 700 and an average PI of some other big, but-not-quite-as-large-as-the-PO-number, average. So I said "good" now I know what is too much. So then I popped in a pressed DVD movie that I had bought (the Matrix) and scanned it. Halfway through the process it stopped scanning, and didn't list an error. I then realized.... OF COURSE! it's a Dual layered DVD! So today i have learned a couple of things:

Average PO rates of 700 are too high
Average PO rates of 16 are not that bad
K-Probe cannot scan the second layer of a Dual Layered DVD.

For what it's worth. So far all the scans that I've done have been very accurate to what I already know about the various discs I've tested. So if a disc has been really finicky in a lot of different devices, it comes up with a lot of errors. But the discs that work in everything always have very low error rates (by comparison). So I'm not sure if the LDW-401S is 100% accurate on the error rates or not, but so far it is 100% consistant with the information I already have, and that gives me a good impression of its' testing abilities!

[aviationwiz]

That's good results dolphinius. What I'd actually like to try, is if you could mail me that DVD that got the very high error rates, then I could compare the scan to being scanned in the LTD-163D. That would give us more information on whether they yield similar results or if they are way off, or if there is a small difference. Email me at:
aviationwiz@yahoo.com

and we can work out some way to exchange disks and such to compare testing capabilities.

[dolphinius_rex]

sure, I'll send you the craptacular disc as soon as I've finished making a copy of it!

Does anyone else have various liteON DVD-ROMs? maybe we can send the same disc around and see how all the various drives do?

[dolphinius_rex]

Grr, I'm having problems making a good copy of the disc! I finally was able to make an image of it, but all of my scans of discs I've burned quit at 94% due to a "030900 Medium Error - Track Following Error" possibly cuased by a high error rate, since the disc I burned was reaching into the 1,000 error area for PO errors, but I've scanned MUCH worse DVDs then that before without having an error stop me (one example would be the really crappy disc I mentioned before!)

I don't want to send my original until I can make a working copy of it (if POSSIBLE!)

[dolphinius_rex]

Out of curiousity, what is the preferred setting for PI/PO Sum ECC? I've heard things in favour of '1' and '8' so far. Any comments or suggestions?

[cfitz]

Use 8. It corresponds to the standard way of measuring errors in DVD specifications, so you can directly compare the PI errors you measure to the 280 maximum allowed level. Karr recommends 8 as well.

Of course, to be completely comparable to the 280 max standard, the disc should be measured at 1x...

cfitz

[dolphinius_rex]

so far most discs I've tested have and error rate average of 600 to 1200 for PI using sum 8

[aviationwiz]

Wow, are those the ones being burned on the LDW-401S? Ouch. My burns on the PX-708A and even on the old Ricoh MP5125 never went over 10 PI Average.

[wicked1]

Can the Sony 500AX read the pi/p0 errors when it is flashed as a LiteOn 400?I dont really want to shutdown the main system to reflash it again to find out.if it did though that would be GREAT. Wouldnt have to have a liteon 166 sitting around here anymore.

[aviationwiz]

No, it shouldn't work, since the LDW-400D is a Sony drive, not a Lite-On drive, which means that it is not capable of showing PI/PO errors.

[dolphinius_rex]

Wow, are those the ones being burned on the LDW-401S? Ouch. My burns on the PX-708A and even on the old Ricoh MP5125 never went over 10 PI Average.

the 600 PI averaging ones are the ones burned on the LiteON 401S, the 1000+ PI average ones are Leda 4x DVD-Rs burned on a Pioneer A05

[rdgrimes]

@dolphinius_rex
If you want to get Pi/PO results that comply with the standards, test at 1x. I usually test at the burn speed (4x or 2.4x). Testing at full speed will almost always give high results. (but maybe not THAT high) On the 401, 6x is CAV, where 4x is CLV, it makes a big difference and 4x is almost as fast.

[aviationwiz]

I have always tested my disks at 8x and it always yields accurate results on-par with the results I get from testing at different speeds.

[aviationwiz]

Hey! The thread is back, cool.

[CDRecorder]

I'm glad to see this thread is back!

Why did it disappear?

[David]

I'm glad to see this thread is back!

Why did it disappear?

It's explained by Ian here.

[CDRecorder]

Thanks for the link.

[dodecahedron]

yeah, it's great that it's back.

i wonder how come? Ian?

now, all we need are new versions of KProbe and LtnFlash!

[QQ]

I got one idea..

When scanning for C1/C2 errors, it would ve VERY nice if K-Probe could map troublesome areas (eg high C1/C2 error count areas) into files, that is so that we could know which files reside on those areas.

For example, maybe they are not important and we dont need to reburn the cd.

Would it be possible?

p.s. maybe there is another program which does this already?

[Gabe]

Hi!

Now I have bought for testing a Lite Ltd 166.

I think that the Kprobe results a little strange. (I have a CD R of prodisc for 90 Min with ave 0.178 C1-Errors, and this is my most rottenly burned media, burned with Lite 24102 B). This CD can´t hardly read by the most disk drive with full speed, some disk drives can´t read this media without unrepairable read errors.

I used media from Prodisc, TDK, Acer, Ritek, Fornet, …. Burned with Cyberdrive CW 058D, Asus CRW 4816A, Yamaha CRW-F1, MSI CR52-A2, the worst average C1-Errors are 0,012.

If I compare the values with LiteOn burners (e.g. see tests CDR-Labs), I must come to the result which all burners burn better than LiteOn

See the review of the 52327S, C1-erros from 0,1 to 22.

What do you think?

BTW, this drive makes bad noises when it´s spin-up or down and reads CD-RW only at a max. speed 24x, is that normal? (FW: DS1A)

Bye
Gabe

[rdgrimes]

KProbe is designed to work with burners. The ROM drives do not respond to speed settings, and also do not report errors the same way as burners. The only real use for your setup is to compare burns on your own system, comparing with any other scans will not be possible.