Over the last year or so, we've had a number of Pioneer's DVD writers drives in the 'Labs. Offering a good mix of performance and features, these drives have become the choice of enthusiasts as well as some of our favorites. With the DVR-2920Q, Pioneer has partnered with Sonic to introduce one of the Qflix enabled DVD writers. With this new technology, consumers can download movies from CinemaNow and burn them to DVD for playback on standard DVD players.
The DVR-2920Q performed very well when writing to DVD+R and DVD-R media at 20x. At this speed, it took less than five minutes to write an entire 4.7GB DVD. The drive also did pretty well in our rewriting tests, turning in some respectable times with DVD-RW and DVD+RW media. Without compatible media, we weren't able to test the DVR-2920Q's full potential when writing to DVD±R DL media. However, when writing at 10x, the drive took about 15 minutes to burn 8GB of data.
When it came to media compatibility, the DVR-2920Q gave us some mixed results. While the drive wrote to all of our test media at its rated speeds or better, only four types were supported at 20x. On the other hand, the DVR-2920Q's writing quality was fairly good, at least with single layer DVD±R media. With DVD±R DL media though, there were a couple of cases where the PI/PIF rates were higher than we'd like to see. Hopefully, Pioneer can address this in a future firmware update.
The DVR-2920Q also performed fairly well in our DVD read tests. While its seek times were a little higher than I would have liked, it was able to read single layer DVD-ROM's and DVD±R media at 16x. The DVR-2920Q also reached some pretty impressive transfer speeds with other types of DVD media. In our tests, it read DVD±RW discs at 13x and both DVD±R DL and DVD±RAM media at 12x.
While not as fast as some of the other drives, the DVR-2920Q performed as expected when reading CD's. In our tests, the drive read pressed and CD-R media at 41x and CD-RW discs at 33x. Pioneer's new drive also did fairly well when ripping audio CD's, reaching DAE speeds as high as 41x. Writing CD's wasn't a problem for the DVR-2920Q either. The drive's 40x CD-R writing speed did put it at a disadvantage in some of our tests. However, its writing quality was very good.
Like Pioneer's previous DVD writers, the DVR-2920Q isn't short on features. To prevent buffer underruns, it has a 2000KB buffer that is backed up by some sort of buffer underrun technology. While this buffer is a little smaller than we'd like to see on a 20x DVD writer, this system worked flawlessly in our tests. The DVR-2920Q also features an anti-dust design with noise reducing mechanisms and support for Pioneer's new Optimal Write Speed technology. Unfortunately, the drive's bitsetting capabilities are fairly limited. While the DVR-2920Q automatically sets the book type to "DVD-ROM" when writing to DVD+R DL discs, it lacks the ability to do the same with single layer DVD+R and DVD+RW media.
Of course, the DVR-2920Q's biggest feature is its support for Sonic’s Qflix technology. Using the bundled software, consumers can purchase movies online from CinemaNow, download them to their computer and then burn them to DVD. Sonic and Pioneer have obviously put a lot of effort into this technology as it worked flawlessly in our tests. Nevertheless, I was a little turned off by the limited selection of titles as well as the amount of time it took to download and burn the movie to disc. This may not bother those already purchasing movies online. However, it's going to be hard to convince consumers to go the Qflix route instead of buying their DVDs at retail stores.
The DVR-2920Q is available now and can be purchased through some of the online vendors found on Pricegrabber. Prices vary depending on the seller, but Pioneer's new Qflix enabled DVD writer can be picked up for less than $60.
| Pioneer DVR-2920Q 20x DVD±RW/RAM |
|
| Features: Installation: Performance: |
8 8 7 |
| Overall: | 8 |
Highs:
- Supports Qflix technology
- Writes to DVD-R and DVD+R media at 20x
- Writes to DVD+R DL and DVD-R DL media at 12x
- Writes to DVD+RW media at 8x
- Writes to DVD-RW media at 6x
- Writes to CD-RW media at 32x
- Reads single layer DVD-ROM's at 16x
- Reads DVD±R media at 16x
- Reads DVD±RW media at 13x
- Reads DVD±R DL media at 12x
- Reads and writes DVD-RAM media at 12x
- Good selection of writing and rewriting speeds
- Includes buffer underrun prevention technology
- Good CD-R writing quality
- Features Pioneer's Optimum Write Speed technology
- Supports bitsetting for DVD+R DL media
Lows:
- Questionable writing quality with some DVD+R and DVD±R DL media
- Reads CD-ROM's and CD-R media at only 40x
- Writes to CD-R media at only 40x
- Cannot set the book type of DVD+R or DVD+RW media
- Overburns to only 94:27
