LG UH10LS20 Super Multi Blue 10x Blu-ray Combo Drive

While CPU, memory, OS and other variables don't often make a huge difference, there are some nonetheless. We have a computer that is used only for testing hardware. We do this so all tests can be compared reliably.

Test System:

For Blu-ray Disc Combo drives, the performance tests are normally broken down into five sections: CD read, CD write, DVD read, DVD write and BD read. Each benchmark test has been run three times. The score given is an average of the three. DMA has been enabled in device manager for all IDE devices supporting it.

CD Read Tests: For the read performance section of the CD-ROM benchmarks, CD WinBench 99 v3.0 and CD Speed v4.7.7.16 are used to test read speeds, access times and CPU usage. For DAE testing, CD Speed is used to give an overall speed rating.

CD Write Tests: To test the write speeds, Nero Burning Rom is used to write 650MB and 700MB to our test media. Times are recorded. To test rewrite scores, Nero is used again to time how long it takes to write 400MB of random files and directories. Then Roxio's Drag-to-Disc is used to test packet writing speeds. The same files are copied and pasted in Windows Explorer and timed.

DVD Read Tests: For the read performance section of the DVD benchmarks CD Speed v4.7.7.16 is used to test read speeds, access times, and CPU usage.

DVD Write Tests: To test the DVD write speeds, Nero Burning Rom is used to write a 4.38GB image to our test media. Times are recorded. Then Roxio's Drag-to-Disc is used to test packet writing speeds. For this, 4GB of random files and directories are copied and pasted in Windows Explorer and timed.

BD Read Tests: For the read performance section of the BD benchmarks, CD Speed v4.7.7.16 is used to test read speeds, access times, and CPU usage.

CD Winbench 99 Scores:

The CD Winbench test is as close as we can get to testing every day usage. It fires off eight different applications using scripts. This tries to mimic the activities of a person loading these programs onto their own computer.

LG's new BD Combo drive gave us some mixed performance in our CD Winbench tests. While the UH10LS20's overall score wasn't as high as some of the other drives, its transfer rates were fairly good. It started reading at 17.9x (2680 / 150) and reached a maximum speed of about 43.1x (6460 / 150) on the outside.

CD Speed v4.7.7.16 - Pressed CD:

For this test I used a pressed CD containing one Mode 1 data track. The disc is 74:38 in size and is full of data and directories.

 

	LG UH10LS20	Lite-On iHES208	LG WH10LS30	Plextor PX-B940SA
Transfer Speed Average: Start: End:	36.10x 20.87x 47.78x	35.68x 20.74x 47.20x	36.01x 20.78x 47.61x	31.40x 18.46x 41.39x
Access Times Random: 1/3: Full:	151ms 173ms 241ms	125ms 140ms 227ms	134ms 148ms 206ms	148ms 169ms 308ms
CPU Usage 1x: 2x: 4x: 8x:	0% 1% 2% 4%	1% 1% 2% 5%	0% 1% 2% 3%	6% 9% 6% 71%

 The UH10LS20 didn't perform as well as I had expected when reading pressed CD's. While rated at 48x, LG's new BD combo drive came up a little short of this number in our tests. Looking at the other scores, its access times were also a little higher than we'd like to see. 

CD Speed v4.7.7.16 - CD-R Media:

For this test I made a copy of our pressed test CD. I used 12x rated Memorex Gold 74 minute media for the tests.

 

	LG UH10LS20	Lite-On iHES208	LG WH10LS30	Plextor PX-B940SA
Transfer Speed Average: Start: End:	36.67x 21.01x 48.58x	36.46x 20.87x 48.34x	36.59x 20.96x 48.72x	31.66x 18.40x 42.02x
Access Times Random: 1/3: Full:	164ms 176ms 224ms	129ms 145ms 212ms	141ms 154ms 207ms	162ms 177ms 374ms
CPU Usage 1x: 2x: 4x: 8x:	1% 1% 2% 4%	1% 1% 4% 6%	0% 1% 2% 4%	0% 1% 3% 6%

The UH10LS20 was a little faster when reading CD-R media. Thanks to this small speed boost, the drive was able to reach a maximum transfer speed of 48.58x in our tests.

LG's new Blu-ray drive had no problems recognizing our 99 minute CompUSA media. The UH10LS20 read our test disc from start to finish, reaching a maximum transfer speed of 49.53x.

 

CD Speed v4.7.7.16 - CD-RW Media:

For this test I made a copy of a pressed test CD. I used some PNY 80 minute CD-RW media for the tests. 

 

	LG UH10LS20	Lite-On iHES208	LG WH10LS30	Plextor PX-B940SA
Transfer Speed Average: Start: End:	30.66x 17.85x 40.51x	30.10x 17.46x 39.79x	30.60x 17.88x 40.42x	18.71x 11.01x 24.71x
Access Times Random: 1/3: Full:	158ms 171ms 221ms	138ms 162ms 250ms	134ms 152ms 203ms	157ms 180ms 319ms
CPU Usage 1x: 2x: 4x: 8x:	0% 1% 2% 4%	1% 1% 3% 6%	0% 1% 2% 3%	0% 1% 2% 4%

While the UH10LS20 is rated at 48x when reading pressed and CD-R media, its CD-RW read speeds are limited to only 40x. As you can see, the drive had no problems reaching this speed in our tests.

CD Speed v4.7.7.7 (DAE) - Pressed CD:

For this test I used Pure Funk. The CD is almost exactly 74 minutes. This helps to squeeze the maximum performance out of the CD.

Exact Audio Copy can tell us a lot about a drive's capabilities. You can see from the screen shot that while the LG UH10LS20 supports accurate stream, caches audio data and has the ability to retrieve C2 error information from audio CD's.     

 

CD Speed	LG UH10LS20	Lite-On iHES208	LG WH10LS30	Plextor PX-B940SA
Average: Start: End: DAE Quality: Accurate Stream:	30.82x 18.20x 40.72x 10 Yes	36.03x 21.71x 47.61x 10 Yes	30.80x 18.26x 40.69x 10 Yes	31.26x 18.84x 41.23x 10 Yes

The UH10LS20 did fairly well in our DAE tests. While not nearly as fast as the Lite-On iHES208, it was able to rip pressed audio CD's at at respectable 40.72x.

CD Speed v4.7.7.16 (DAE) - CD-R Media:

For this test I used a copy of the Pure Funk CD. It's burned onto the same Memorex Gold 74 minute media I used in the CD Speed tests.

 

CD Speed	LG UH10LS20	Lite-On iHES208	LG WH10LS30	Plextor PX-B940SA
Average: Start: End: DAE Quality: Accurate Stream:	30.23x 18.03x 39.86x 10 Yes	35.70x 21.49x 47.07x 10 Yes	30.20x 18.04x 39.81x 10 Yes	31.02x 18.79x 41.05x 10 Yes

LG's new BD combo drive was a little slower when ripping audio CD-R discs. While the drive still performed relatively well, it reached a maximum DAE speed of only 39.86x. So how did it do in CD Speed's advanced DAE tests? Take a look below.

The UH10LS20 completed CD Speed's advanced DAE tests with an average score of 28.99x. The drive did not create any errors, but for whatever reason, it was not able to pass all of the on-the-fly copying tests. If you look at the advanced features, you can see that the UH10LS20 was able to read the CD-Text, subchannel data and lead in but failed to read the lead out section of the CD.