LG GSA-H10N Super-Multi DVD±RW/RAM

DVD Write and ReWrite Tests - Nero Burning Rom 6.6.1.4 andDLA 4.95:

To test the DVD writing performance of LG's new drive I used Verbatim 16x DVD+R, 16x DVD-R, 8x DVD+RW and 6x DVD-RW media. To get the writing times, a 4.38GB image was burned to our test discs using Nero.

The GSA-H10N is one of the few drives to use P-CAV, or Partial CAV, when writing to DVD+R and DVD-R media at 16x. By looking at the screenshots above, you can see that LG's new drive starts writing at about 7.2x and accelerates, reaching its maximum speed at about the 3.7GB minute mark.

The GSA-H10N also features 8x DVD+RW and 6x DVD-RW writing speeds. While the drive uses CLV when writing to DVD-RW media, it uses Z-CLV to reach its maximum DVD+RW writing speed.

LG's new "Super-Multi" drive performed very well in our DVD writing tests. While not as fast as the drives from NEC and Plextor when writing to DVD+RW media, the GSA-H10N turned in some of the fastest DVD+R, DVD-R and DVD-RW writing times we've seen.

To check the media compatibility of the GSA-H10N, I ran a few tests using some of the media available in my area. The media types, along with the average time it took the drive to write our 4.38GB image, are listed below.

So what about writing quality? Testing a drive's DVD writing quality isn't easy. Until now, there were very few options, unless you wanted to shell out thousands of dollars for a certified test machine. Thanks to KProbe, we can test a disc's PI (Parity Inner) and PIF (Parity Inner Fail) rates.For these tests I used a Lite-On SOHW-1673S (firmware JS07) and read the discs at 4x with the PI and PIF ECC sums set to 8 and 1 respectively. For comparison, I also tested the discs on a BenQ DW1640. When combined with Nero CD Speed, the DW1640 is able to report PI Errors, PI Failures, Parity Outer Failures and even jitter levels. For this test, the discs are read at 8x with both the PI and PIF ECC sums set to 8.

So what are "good" results supposed to look like? With KProbe, the PI errors should not exceed 280 and the number of PIF errors should stay below 4. When testing with CD Speed, the number of PI errors should stay below 280 as well. However, because it scans with an ECC sum of 8, a higher number of PIF errors is acceptable, as long as they do not exceed 32. Since POF errors are uncorrectable, we really don't want to see any of them at all.

I also put these discs through a "stress test" by reading them back at 16x with the DW1640. By reading these discs back at this speed, we can see if there are any readability issues caused by the number of errors or high levels of jitter.

The GSA-H10N's writing quality was pretty good with most of the DVD+R media we tested. In most cases, the PI/PIF rates stayed well within acceptable limits. The only exception was RiDATA's 16x DVD+R media. When tested with KProbe and CD Speed, there was a large PI spike at the 2.7GB mark.

I should also point out that the jitter rates were higher than we're used to seeing. Looking at the CD Speed screenshots, you can see that there were a number of cases where it exceeded 18%. While I hesitate to write this off as some sort of fluke, the high jitter rates did not seem to have any effect on readability.

Lastly, here are some results from our DVD-R test media. While the writing quality varied from one manufacturer to another, the PI/PIF rates were fairly good for the most part. If you look at the CD Speed screenshots though, you can see that the jitter rates were again quite high.

To test the GSA-H10N's packet writing performance I used DLA 4.95. Verbatim 8x DVD+RW, Verbatim 6x DVD-RW and Maxell 12x DVD-RAM media were used once again.

LG's new "Super-Multi" drive performed pretty well in our packet writing tests. While not the fastest drive here, it turned in some fairly good writing times with DVD-RW and DVD+RW media. Most impressive though, was the GSA-H10N's performance with DVD-RAM media. Due to its 12x writing speed, it was nearly twice as fast as the drives from the competition.

Double Layer DVD Write Tests - Nero Burning Rom 6.6.1.4:

To test the double layer DVD writing performance of the GSA-H10N, I used Verbatim 8x DVD+R DL, Verbatim 2.4x DVD+R DL, Memorex 2.4x DVD+R DL and Verbatim 4x DVD-R DL media. I created about 8GB of random files and directories on my hard drive and then burned them to our test discs with Nero.

Finding DVD+R DL media that would work at 10x was not an easy task. The only media we found that would work at this speed were Verbatim's 8x DVD+R DL discs. With Verbatim's 2.4x DVD+R DL media, the writing speed was limited to 6x and Memorex's Ritek manufactured discs would not work at anything faster than 2.4x.

The GSA-H10N had no problems taking the top spot in this test. Thanks to its 10x DVD+R DL writing speed, the drive took a little more than 14 minutes to write 8001MB of data. So what about writing quality? Take a look below.

The writing quality wasn't as good as I had expected with Verbatim's 8x DVD+R DL media. While the error rate started out fairly low, it jumped up considerably on the second layer. The results were better with Verbatim's 2.4x DVD+R DL media. However, there is still room for improvement as there was an excessive number of PI Failures. The worst results were with Memorex's 2.4x DVD+R DL media. The PI/PIF rates were very high at the layer change and there were a small number of PO Failures.

The GSA-H10N also features 6x DVD-R DL writing speeds. To test the drive's writing times, DVD-R DL media from Verbatim was used.

This time around, it took the GSA-H10N about 19:12 to write 8001MB of data. While faster than the drives from Lite-On and NEC, it trailed behind the PX-760A by a small margin. So what about writing quality? Take a look below.

The GSA-H10N's writing quality was pretty good with Verbatim's 4x DVD-R DL media. The PI/PIF rates stayed within acceptable limits when tested with both KProbe and CD Speed and there were no readability problems.

Performance Revisited:

While LG's new "Super-Multi" drive has a few rough spots, it performed pretty well throughout most of our tests. The GSA-H10N flew through our DVD writing tests, turning in some impressive times with DVD±R, DVD+R DL and DVD-RAM media. LG still needs to tweak the firmware some as there were a few cases where the the writing quality could have been better. Reading DVD's wasn't a problem for the GSA-H10N either. The drive was able to read single layer, data DVD-ROM's and DVD±R discs at 16x, but slowed to only 5x when reading DVD videos.

The GSA-H10N also did relatively well in our CD read tests. The drive read pressed and CD-R discs at speeds near 48x and had some fairly good seek times. When writing CD's, the GSA-H10N performed as expected. While not as fast as some of the other drives we've looked at, its writing quality was quite good. With all things considered, the LG GSA-H10N gets a 7 out of 10 for the performance section of this review.