Anyone knows how much will the new TEAC CD-W548E gonna cost?

[Harrier]

Thanks.

[Han]

Around $85.

[Ian]

There are already 1 or 2 places on Pricewatch with the drive.

[articulate]

...any plans for a review in the (near?) future...?

[Han]

In the meantime you can check the review at CDR-Info.

My jaw dropped when I saw that it uses P-CAV writing mode. It's basically a Lite-On drive with a few (quality) improvements...

[Ian]

If TEAC sends us one.. sure. However, I'm not expecting them to.

And no, I'm not going to go out and buy one this time around.

[Telstar]

In the meantime you can check the review at CDR-Info.

My jaw dropped when I saw that it uses P-CAV writing mode. It's basically a Lite-On drive with a few (quality) improvements...

This model is more like a rebadged ASUS CRW-4816A, it even showed FlextraLink under Nero. Looks like TEAC has decided to move on to DVD recorders.

[Ian]

This model is more like a rebadged ASUS CRW-4816A, it even showed FlextraLink under Nero. Looks like TEAC has decided to move on to DVD recorders.

Yeah, their DVD-RW isn't made by them either. It's a Pioneer. Makes me wonder whats going on over at TEAC.

[jase]

The question is, though, are these drives actually manufactured by Asus/Pioneer or have TEAC taken the base designs and adapted them?

Remember that for a long time TEAC CDRW drives were essentially Sanyo reference designs with a TEAC transport and higher quality control.

The CDR Info review of the 48x TEAC was glowing. The writing quality was typical TEAC and the reading characteristics didn't seem to match up with the Asus all that well.

As for price, it seems that the 48x TEAC (at least in Europe) is approximately the same price as the 52x LiteOn.

[jase]

I have come to the conclusion that this TEAC is not a straight clone of the Asus. It may or may not be based on it, but I am pretty sure TEAC is not just rebadging here:

1) The Asus is made in Taiwan, the TEAC in China.

2) The Firmware numbers are incompatible; Asus has 1.X, TEAC has 1.XX.

3) The TEAC does not start audio extraction slowly as the Asus does.

4) The writing quality of the TEAC is much higher than the Asus reviewed here. And it is not reducing write-speed to 32x, but going straight down to 16x.

5) The TEAC has the proprietary Fine Focus technology which the Asus lacks.

6) The read speeds are too different to be based on the same mechanism.

HAVING SAID ALL THIS, I find it difficult to believe that this is a pure TEAC design. The performance with scratched audio media is just too poor, TEAC usually excels in this area.

In conclusion, while I am willing to accept that TEAC has probably taken the Asus base design, the two drives are not the same.

I am going to buy one, I am a huge TEAC fan and I must see how this drive performs. I'll let you guys know, hopefully before Christmas

[Scour]

Hello!

I think that Teac lincensed the Flextra-Link from Asus, because Teac´s uses no longer Sanyo-chipsets, now they use MediaTek.

I think the Teac is made by Teac, not by Asus

The Teac DVD-Rom DV 516 must be a Pioneer, i heard it from a friend

[Telstar]

The third post in the following link, though in traditional Chinese, has a comparison between the ASUS and TEAC circuit boards:

http://forum.1bits.com/showthread.php?s ... genumber=3

You can decide for yourself whether this new TEAC model was OEMed by ASUS, and looking forward to jase's review.

[jase]

Interesting -- that certainly does seem to be conclusive!

But as I say, there must be some differences. The difference in performance between Ian's Asus review and CDRInfo John's TEAC one are just to great. I can't believe it's just firmware either. And why would one be built in Taiwan and one in China?

In an ideal world I'd go out and buy both drives and let you guys all know, but my finances are infinite

The question is, of course, given they are Mediatek-based, can the cheaper (and inferior given the reviews) Asus be reflashed to become a TEAC drive? That would be an interesting conversion, I must say!

A small snag anyway; the only company in the UK I can find selling TEACs online won't take Switch debit cards for some reason, only Visa/Mastercard. So that's a few more days' delay, tsk.

[Telstar]

...But as I say, there must be some differences. The difference in performance between Ian's Asus review and CDRInfo John's TEAC one are just to great. I can't believe it's just firmware either. And why would one be built in Taiwan and one in China?

To answer your questions (again, based on the info from the above source), ASUS had already moved its low-end models' production to China. Like Lite-On, ASUS usually produces the first batch of their new product in Taiwan (kind of like engineering samples), and later trasfers the mass production to its factory in China after production process is stablized. Since the 48X writer has been replaced by the 52X, it's not surprising that ASUS decided to move the 48X production to China. There were actually a few threads in the above forum discussing which ASUS model was still made in Taiwan.

If you compare the TEAC 48X with the ASUS 48X info provided in the CDR-Info's review article, you'll realize that the differences between these two are quite small especially in contrast to the other three brands in the comparison. I think Ian's review dealt with an earlier version of the firmware, which may explain the differences.

Of course, TEAC may still have decided to add something different, say a different laser pickup or somrthing else. But it is more of an ASUS clone than a TEAC's own W540E. Just my two cents.

[articulate]

Could this mean the 540E might be the last "real" Teac?

[Han]

CD-W540E is the last real TEAC.