Optical drive or CD drive is an optical-mechanical device designed for reading information from, presented in the form of CDs of 8 and 12 cm in size. Modern CD drives are universal; in addition to reading, they can also write various types of information to disks of various formats : disposable and reusable CDs (CD-R and CD-RW), disposable and reusable DVDs (DVD-R and DVD-RW).

Operating principle of an optical drive

The main element of a disk drive is an optical system that generates a laser beam that reads information from a rotating media. Information on a CD is recorded in the form of a spiral track on which microscopic depressions are burned with a laser beam. In mass production of data disks, information is entered onto them using the stamping method from a special matrix.

If you look at the surface of the disk through a microscope, you can see alternating tubercles and pits, from which the laser beam is reflected with different intensities - more from the tubercles, less from the pits. And given that the computer processes information in binary number(encoded by a sequence of zeros and ones), then in the alternation of pits and tubercles, data can be written in a certain way. Here the bump acts as a one, and the depression represents a binary zero.

CD drive device

The most common CD drives today are devices for installation in an internal bay, the so-called optical drives form factor 5.25 inches. Here 5.25 inches is the size of the large compartment in the computer case for installing devices.

Inside the iron case are located electronic board, motors for rotating the disk and optical system, the optical system itself for reading and writing to a CD. On the back of the drive there are connectors for connecting to motherboard and nutrition. The front panel contains a pull-out tray for inserting a CD, a tray eject/close button and a read/write indicator.

Your computer will likely have at least one optical drive that can accommodate a DVD or CD in its output tray.

Alternative to optical drives

Recently, the popularity of CDs for computers has fallen sharply due to the massive proliferation of other types of storage media, primarily flash memory or otherwise “flash drives”. The popularity of flash drives is due to their low cost, sufficient memory capacity and read/write speed. In addition, external storage devices are widely used to store large amounts of information. hard disks, connected to

Optical drives DVD-RW, undoubtedly occupy a leading position in the market today. The Russian market of computer components is no exception. DVD-RW not only reads CDs and DVDs, but also writes both CD-R/RW media and larger capacity DVD-R/RW and DVD+R/+RW. And if in addition there is Super-Multi, then the DVD-RAM format is also added here. These devices are, without a doubt, both relevant and promising today.

For 20-30 dollars you can purchase an optical drive, the functional set of which will satisfy the needs of the average consumer. Today it is difficult to imagine a modern PC without DVD-RW. After all, it is the most attractive device in terms of price and capabilities.

Blu-ray is the modern standard for optical drives

In addition to the devices listed above, mention should be made of such a modern high-tech format as Blu-ray. This format is used for high-density recording and storage of digital data. It got its name thanks to the use of a blue (blue, which is where the name comes from) short-wave laser in the writing/reading process.

During 2006-2008, Blu-ray competed with the then-existing alternative format HD DVD. But still, as a result of this “format war,” Blu-ray emerged victorious. It was predicted to have a great future and widespread distribution, but this never happened. Primarily due to the high cost of the device itself. Secondly, because of the high cost of disks. Even today such drives are installed in new system unit quite rare. And preference is given to its older brother DVD.

Discs of this format have from one to ten layers with a capacity of 25 to 320 gigabytes, respectively. Among them there are discs for one-time recording BD-R, as well as reusable BD-RE media.

Today's market conditions for optical drives are such that “read-only” drives have almost completely outlived their usefulness functionally. The reason for this was a significant reduction in prices for disc recording devices. Moreover, modern CD-RW drives have already reached the peak of their development, which is reflected in their functional and speed characteristics. Most likely, the innovative potential of manufacturing companies in this area is almost exhausted. DVD burners are coming into circulation more and more every day.

However, you shouldn't write off CD burners too soon. Only now they have become available to absolutely everyone. Almost everyone new computer is equipped with at least a CD-RW drive. That is why in our review we tried to explore as widely as possible the line of recording optical drives available on our market. Therefore, below we consider both low-, mid-, and high-end devices, a total of 11 copies.

AOpen CRW-5232

AOpen drives belong to the budget sector of the disc reader and writer market - their price is quite acceptable for many consumers. At the same time, the AOpen CRW-5232 optical drive has enough high quality manufacturing, and also meets modern requirements for speed characteristics.

The front panel has a discreet design, but is not without its own style. It contains a headphone output, a volume control, a drive operation indicator, and buttons for rewinding/playing audio tracks and ejecting the tray.

On the back of the drive there is a Molex power connector, an IDE interface connector, digital and analog audio outputs, and two sets of pins for positioning the drive and its factory testing.

Technical Specifications:

CD-ROM: 4x, 8x, 10x, 12x, 16x, 24x, 32x, 40x, 48x, 52x;
CD-R: 8x, 12x, 16x, 24x, 32x, 40x, 48x, 52x;
CD-RW: 4x, 10x, 12x, 16x, 24x, 32x;
CD: CD-DA, CD-Extra, CD-RW, CD-Text, Video-CD, CD-ROM, CD-ROM XA, CD-I, Photo-CD;
CD-ROM: 100 ms;

JustLink
JustSpeed- technology that optimizes the recording speed of discs to minimize errors that occur when burning at speeds above 16x.

As you can see, the drive supports quick formatting of Mount Rainier rewritable CD-RW discs.

ASUS CRW-5232AS

The well-known Taiwanese manufacturer of computer components, ASUS, has long been producing optical drives under its own brand. The company's products in this category are positioned as mainstream solutions. However, their quality and technical specifications have always been up to standard.

The front panel design is simple and tasteful. It contains an audio output for headphones, an audio volume control, two LED indicators indicating the drive status (read/write), as well as a button for moving through audio tracks and a button for loading/unloading discs.

On the back of the case there are interface and power connectors, digital and analog audio outputs, and two sets of pins for drive positioning and factory testing.

It is also worth noting that, thanks to the single-chip design, the drive has reduced dimensions and weight, which can greatly facilitate its installation in the now fashionable barebone systems.

The drive was tested in OEM version without any accessories.

Technical Specifications:

CD-ROM: 4x, 8x, 16x, 24x, 32x, 40x, 48x, 52x;
CD-R: 4x, 8x, 16x, 24x, 32x, 40x, 48x, 52x;
CD-RW: 4x, 10x, 12x, 16x, 24x, 32x.
CD: CD-ROM, CD-ROM/XA, Photo CD, CD-I, CD-Extra, CD-Text, Video CD, Audio CD, I-Trax;
CD-R/RW: DAO, TAO, SAO, Multisession, Packet Write;
CD-ROM: 100 ms;

The drive also supports the following proprietary technologies:

DDSS II- Double Dynamic Suspension System, the second generation of disk stabilization system during operation;
AFFM– AirFlow Field Modification, air flow modification technology that reduces noise during read/write processes;
FlextraLink- technology for preventing errors associated with underloading of the buffer;
FlextraSpeed- technology for selecting the optimal recording speed to reduce the error level to a minimum.

The label on the top panel gives general information about the place and time of production of the drive:

Now let's move on to studying the information about the drive obtained using utilities. To do this, we will use the programs NeroInfoTool and DVDInfoPro, with their help you can roughly learn about supported technologies, formats and types of discs.

BenQ 5232P

During its presence in our market, the young company BenQ has managed to establish itself well as a manufacturer of high-quality and relatively inexpensive LCD panels, computer peripherals, scanners and optical drives.

The BenQ 5232P drive has a simple, unremarkable design. Under the tray, on the front panel, there is an audio output for headphones, an audio volume control, a button for moving through audio CD tracks, and a tray eject/load button.

On the rear panel of the drive you can find a power connector, an interface connector, pins for positioning the drive, analog and digital outputs.

The drive was tested in OEM version without any accessories.

Technical Specifications:

CD-ROM: 40x, 52x;
CD-RW: 4x, 10x, 12x, 16x, 20x, 24x, 32x.
CD: CD-DA, CD-ROM (mode 1 and 2), CD-ROM XA, CD-I, CD-I Ready, Video CD, CD Extra, Karaoke CD (VCD format), Enhanced CD, Photo-CD, CD-RW, CD-WO;
CD-R/RW: DAO, TAO, SAO, Multisession, Packet Write;
CD-ROM: 80 ms;

By default, the drive's CD reading speed is limited to 40x. However, after holding down the Eject button for three seconds, the speed was set to 52x.

The drive also supports the following proprietary technologies:

Seamless Link- allows the CD-RW drive to remember the address of the recording end point and stop recording while a buffer error occurs - it is empty.

The label on the top panel gives general information about the place and time of manufacture of the drive:

LG GCE-8522B

LG optical drives are widespread in our country. They have a reputation for being cheap and not very high quality products. We will be able to see later whether the LG GCE-8522B drive that took part in testing will confirm its reputation later, but now about the design and declared functionality.

The drive tray, on which you can read the name of the manufacturer and the speed formula, is made in the usual LG style - it has rounded lines that give a “soft” shade to the entire design. Under the tray there is an audio output for headphones, a volume control, a drive operation indicator and a disc eject button.

On the back of the drive there is a power connector, an IDE cable connector, pins that determine the position of the device on the interface cable, analog and digital audio outputs.

The drive was tested in OEM version without any accessories.

Technical Specifications:

CD-ROM: 52x;
CD-R: 8x, 16x, 24x, 32x, 40x, 52x;
CD-RW: 4x, 10x, 16x, 24x.
CD-R/RW: DAO, TAO, SAO, Multisession, Packet Write;
CD-ROM: 90 ms;

The drive also supports the following proprietary technologies:

A.F.T.- Anti Flutter Technology, reduces the error rate when writing discs at high speeds.

The label on the top panel gives general information about the place and time of manufacture of the drive:

As you can see, the drive supports quick formatting of Mount Rainier rewritable CD-RW discs.

Mitsumi CR-485GTE

The drive from Mitsumi has a strict, classic design. The set of elements located on the front panel is standard: headphone output, volume control, led indicator drive operation and a tray eject button on which the speed formula is applied.

Looking at back panel drive, you can find a Molex connector, interface connector, drive positioning pins, analog and digital audio outputs.

The drive was tested in OEM version without any accessories.

Technical Specifications:

CD-ROM: 4x, 16x, 32x, 40x, 54x;
CD-R: 4x, 16x, 32x, 40x, 54x;
CD-RW: 1x, 2x, 4x, 10x, 12x, 16x, 24x, 32x.
CD: CD-R/RW, CD-ROM Mode 1,2, CD-ROM XA, CD-Plus, CD Extra, CD Text, Mixed CD, CD-I FMV, CD-DA, Video CD, Photo-CD, Video CD;
CD-R/RW: DAO, TAO, SAO, Multisession, Packet Write;
CD-ROM: 120 ms;

The drive also supports the following proprietary technologies:

ExacLink- technology to prevent errors due to buffer underruns.

The label on the top panel gives general information about the place and time of manufacture of the drive:

As you can see, the drive supports quick formatting of Mount Rainier rewritable CD-RW discs.

MSI CR52-M

The Taiwanese company MSI has been producing optical drives relatively recently. However, its products for this market segment have already gained well-deserved popularity. And not the least role was played here by the original design solutions that the company implements in its drives.

The drive was tested in full retail. And the first thing that catches your eye when opening the box is the three replaceable front panels, which give the drive an original and stylish look. It is for this reason that the MSI CR52-M wins the Best Design Award.

The rest of the package includes the drive itself, an analog audio cable, a CD with Nero program Burning Rom and instructions for its use. It's a pity, of course, that MSI's optical package is somewhat below the level of its video cards, but still, it's better than nothing.

On the back side of the drive there are three rows of pins (two for factory testing, one for positioning), digital and analog audio outputs, interface and power connectors.

Technical Specifications:

CD-ROM: 40x, 52x;
CD-R: 4x, 8x, 12x, 16x, 20x, 24x, 32x, 40x, 48x, 52x;
CD-RW: 2x, 4x, 10x, 12x, 16x, 24x, 32x.
CD: CD-R/RW, CD-ROM Mode 1,2, CD-ROM XA, CD-Plus, CD Extra, CD Text, Mixed CD, CD-I FMV, CD-DA, Video CD, Photo-CD, Video CD;
CD-ROM: 80 ms;

The drive also supports the following proprietary technologies:

ABS- Anti-Bumping System, technology that reduces disk vibration, which allows you to read data with greater accuracy;
SoftBurn- noise reduction technology;
SuperLink- protection technology against data buffer underrun;
HyperGuard- provides protection for low-quality disks from destruction when reading/writing at high speeds.

The label on the top panel gives general information about the place and time of manufacture of the drive:

As you can see, the drive supports quick formatting of Mount Rainier rewritable CD-RW discs.

MSI CRE52-M

External optical drives are not very common in our market and are not in great demand. The reason most likely lies in the lack of demand for these devices, as well as the high price relative to domestic analogues. However, their presence should not be completely ignored. external drives have one undeniable advantage - there is no need to disassemble the computer in order to use it. Often this opportunity turns out to be decisive when choosing a drive - after all, sometimes the selling company prohibits opening the computer case until the warranty period expires.

The external “burner” is represented in this review by a drive from MSI. The drive has a nice looking (and touching;)) design. On the front panel you can see a tray eject/load button and a button for skipping audio tracks. It’s immediately worth noting that both buttons act as LED indicators. When a disc is inserted, the "Eject" button glows a pleasant blue color. During reading, the second button has the peculiarity of blinking blue, and when you try to write something down, the blue color changes to green. The developers have not forgotten the audio output for headphones, coupled with a volume control.

On the rear side, the drive has an output for connecting a USB cable, an audio output, an on/off switch for the device, and an output for the power supply.

In addition to the MSI CRE520-M drive itself, the standard package includes: a power supply along with the necessary adapters for connecting it to the drive, a USB and audio cable, a quick installation guide, a disk with Nero Burning Rom software and a small booklet on its use.

Technical Specifications:

CD-ROM: 40x, 52x;
CD-R: 4x, 8x, 12x, 16x, 24x, 32x, 40x, 48x, 52x;
CD-RW: 2x, 4x, 10x, 12x, 16x, 24x, 32x.
CD: CD-R/RW, CD-ROM Mode 1,2, CD-ROM XA, CD-Plus, CD Extra, CD Text, Mixed CD, CD-I FMV, CD-DA, Video CD, Photo-CD, Video CD;
CD-R/RW: Disc-at-Once, Track-at-Once, Session-at-Once, Multisession, Packet Writing, RAW Mode;
CD-ROM: 80 ms;

By default, the drive's CD reading speed is limited to 40x. However, after holding down the Eject button for three seconds, the speed was set to 52x.

As you can see, the drive supports quick formatting of Mount Rainier rewritable CD-RW discs.

NEC NR-9400A

NEC drives are widespread in our market and have a reputation for inexpensive and high-quality devices. In our review, the Japanese company is represented by the NR-9400A model - today it is the most modern in the NEC line of CD-RW drives.

As you can see in the photo, its design is no different from other products of the company. If my memory serves me correctly, the design has not changed for 3-4 years. However, the drive doesn’t look bad anyway - strict straight lines, the name of the manufacturer printed on the tray, an audio output, a signal volume control, a drive operation indicator and a tray eject button - everything is done simply and tastefully.

The rear panel of the NR-9400A is also unremarkable. It contains connectors for connecting power, interface, analog and digital cables, as well as three rows of pins for positioning.

The drive was tested in OEM version without any accessories.

Technical Specifications:

CD-ROM: 4x, 8x, 10x, 12x, 16x, 24x, 32x, 40x, 48x;
CD-R: 4x, 8x, 16x, 24x, 32x, 40x, 48x;
CD-RW: 4x, 10x, 12x, 16x, 24x, 32x.
CD: CD-R/RW, CD-ROM Mode 1,2, CD-ROM XA, CD-Plus, CD Extra, CD Text, Mixed CD, CD-I FMV, CD-DA, Video CD, Photo-CD, Video CD;
CD-R/RW: DAO, TAO, SAO, Multisession, Packet Write;
CD-ROM: 110 ms;

The manufacturer's official website does not say anything about the drive's support for any proprietary technologies. However, protection against buffer underrun is mentioned, which, however, is not at all surprising - drives without it have not been produced for several years now.

The label on the top panel gives general information about the place and time of manufacture of the drive:

As you can see, the drive supports quick formatting of Mount Rainier rewritable CD-RW discs.

Plextor PlexWriter Premium and PlexTools

The Japanese company Plextor has been present on our market for a very short time. However, its products are in wide demand around the world and have a reputation for functionality and quality.

The Plextor PlexWriter Premium model is presented in our review in two colors: black and white. The front panel of the drive has a strict, unremarkable design, however, like most of the company's products. Under the tray, on which the model name is printed, there is an audio output for headphones, a volume control, an LED indicator and a disc eject button. The indicator is orange, indicating that the disc is being read/written, and green when a disc is simply inserted into the drive. The rear side contains interface and power connectors, digital and analog audio outputs, as well as a set of pins for positioning the drive. Let us also draw your attention to the fact that the drive tray is black, which, according to the company, reduces the level of C1 errors and reduces jitter.

As for the drive with a black front panel, the color is the only thing that distinguishes it from its white counterpart, as you can see by looking at the photo:

The delivery set includes the following components: the drive itself; two disks with software; CD-R disc from Verbatim(???), certified for recording at 52x speed; 40-wire interface IDE cable; a bag with mounting screws, a jumper and a device for emergency removal of the drive tray without turning on the computer; a small insert containing instructions for mounting the drive and installing the main software; very good user manual English language describing the installation, configuration and use of the drive.

Despite the complete identity of both devices, the configuration and packaging of the “black” one has some differences:

Instead of one 700 MB CD-R disc Verbatim, kit includes 700 MB CD-R and 650 MB CD-RW discs produced by Plextor itself, there is also no interface cable. Perhaps, this is where all the differences between the drives end.

The drive comes standard with the following software:

Easy CD Creator 6 (program for burning CD/DVD discs);
PlexTools.

And perhaps we’ll dwell on the latter in more detail.

Plextools

The proprietary PlexTools utility allows you to configure various drive parameters, as well as perform some tests on the quality of writing and reading disks.

We believe that the capabilities of this program should be examined in more detail. Therefore, below we provide a more complete description of each of its sections.

General Information:

Displays information about installed IDE devices, as well as information about the firmware and buffer size of optical drives.

Drive Settings:

Basic: allows you to adjust the reading speed of CD/DVD discs, the speed at which discs stop and the audio output volume.

Advanced: turns on/off buffer underrun protection during recording, allows you to “hide” the “origin” of inserted CD-R discs from other programs, initializes support for DMA mode, etc.

VariRec (CD): Enables/disables the use of VariRec mode, which allows you to manually adjust the laser power when recording (disabled by default).

GigaRec: turns on/off GigaRec technology, which allows you to write up to 1 GB of information onto one standard 700 MB disk; however, very few drives can then read data from it.

Silent Mode: regulates maximum speed disk read/write, access speed (Access time) and drive tray eject/load speed (!).

SecuRec: allows you to set a password to access the recorded disc at the hardware level.

Drive Information:

Displays information about supported speed modes, as well as the types of discs readable and writable.

CD/DVD Info:

Shows information about the disc inserted into the drive.

Multimedia Player:

The simplest player for various multimedia files (WAV, MP3, MPEG4, etc.).

AudioCD Player:

The simplest AudioCD player.

Digital Audio Extraction:

Quite a functional "ripper" of AudioCD discs.

Audio CD Maker:

"Burner" of AudioCD discs.

CD/DVD-ROM Maker:

Burns CD/DVD discs.

CD/DVD Copy:

Makes an exact copy of a disk to another disk or to an image on a hard drive.

CD/DVD RW Functions:

Performs quick/full formatting of CD/DVD RW discs.

CD/DVD Test:

Searches for fatal errors on the disk and also identifies potential read errors.

Read Transfer Rate Test:

Performs sequential reading of data from the disk to calculate the data transfer rate over the interface.

Write Transfer Rate Test:

Performs sequential recording (in emulation mode) of data to disk to calculate the data transfer rate over the interface.

Q-Check C1/C2 Test:

Test the quality of the recorded CD-R/RW disc, checks for C1, C2 and CU errors.

Q-Check FE/TE Test:

Test mechanical characteristics empty CD-R/RW discs (carried out in emulation mode).

Q-Check Beta/Jitter Test:

Test the quality of the recorded CD-R/RW disc, checks for Beta and Jitter errors.

Q-Check PI/PO Test:

The quality test of the recorded DVD±R/RW disc shows the number of Parity Inner and Parity Outer errors (available only for Plextor DVD burners).

Technical Specifications:

CD-ROM: 4x, 8x, 24x, 32x, 40x, 52x;
CD-R: 4x, 8x, 16x, 20x, 24x, 32x, 40x, 52x;
CD-RW: 4x, 10x, 16x, 20x, 24x, 32x;
CD: CD-DA, CD-ROM, CD-ROM + CD-DA, CD-ROM XA, CD-I, PHOTO-CD, VIDEO-CD, CD-Extra, CD+G, CD-TEXT;
CD-R/RW: DAO, TAO, SAO, Multisession, Packet Write;
CD-ROM:<65 мс;

The drive also supports the following proprietary technologies:

GigaRec- allows you to record up to 1.2 GB of data on one standard 99-minute disc or 1 GB per 80-minute disc. However, in the future very few drives will be able to read data from it;
SecuRec- allows you to protect data at the hardware level;
Silent Mode- allows you to configure access time, read and write speed, as well as disk ejection time at your discretion;
Q-Check- provides support for error checking (C1/C2 test, FE/TE test and Beta/Jitter test) before and after the recording process;
BURN-Proof- buffer underrun protection;
PowerRec II- technology that regulates the recording speed of discs to minimize possible errors;
VariRec- allows you to manually adjust the audio tone settings when recording audio CDs.

The label on the top panel gives general information about where and when the actuators were manufactured:

As you can see, both devices are practically the same here - both were made in China in August 2003. Even the first five digits of the serial number are the same, which indicates that the drives belong to the same batch.

Now let's move on to studying information about drives obtained using utilities. To do this, we will use the programs NeroInfoTool and DVDInfoPro, with their help you can roughly learn about supported technologies, formats and types of discs.

Let me make a reservation right away that all the results of both Plextor drives are almost completely identical. For this reason, diagrams and table data are presented in a single copy.

As you can see, the drives support the quick formatting function of Mount Rainier rewritable CD-RW discs, and also have the largest buffer compared to the rest of the review participants.

Sony CRX230E

In fact, the Sony CRX230E drive is a rebranded product from LiteOn. This fact is evidenced by both its design and its characteristics. On the front panel there is an audio output for headphones, an audio volume control, an LED drive indicator and a tray eject/load button.

On the back of the drive there are analog and digital audio outputs, drive positioning pins, Molex and IDE connectors.

It is also worth noting that the length of the drive allows it to be mounted even in the smallest housings - it is only 170 mm.

The drive was tested in OEM version without any accessories.

Technical Specifications:

CD-ROM: 4x, 8x, 12x, 16x, 24x, 32x, 40x, 52x;
CD-R: 4x, 8x, 12x,16x, 20x, 24x, 32x, 40x, 48x, 52x;
CD-RW: 4x, 10x, 16x, 24x, 32x.
CD: CD-R/RW, CD-ROM Mode 1,2, CD-ROM XA, CD-Plus, CD Extra, CD Text, Mixed CD, CD-I FMV, CD-DA, Video CD, Photo-CD, Video CD;
CD-R/RW: DAO, TAO, SAO, Multisession, Packet Write;
CD-ROM: 100 ms;

The drive also supports the following proprietary technologies:

Power-Burn- technology to protect the buffer from emptying.

The label on the top panel gives general information about the place and time of manufacture of the drive:

As you can see, the drive supports quick formatting of Mount Rainier rewritable CD-RW discs.

resultstesting:

Nero CD-DVD Speed: Write Transfer Rate

To carry out the test, eight discs were recorded in emulation mode: CD-R Digitex 52x, CD-R Verbatim 48x, CD-R e-ProFormance 24x (800 MB), CD-R Philips 48x (800 MB), CD-RW e- ProFormance 12x, CD-RW Verbatim 10x, CD-RW Verbatim 24x, CD-RW Verbatim 32x.

CD-R Digitex 52x:

AOpen CRW-5232

ASUS CRW-5232AS

BenQ 5232P

LG GCE-8522B

Mitsumi CR-485GTE

MSI CR52-M

MSI CRE52-M

NEC NR-9400A

Plextor PlexWriter Premium

Sony CRX230E

The disc from Digitex is certified for recording at 52x speed. However, not all drives were able to record it at such a speed. In particular, this applies to BenQ, LG, Mitsumi, NEC and Sony. If everything is clear with the NEC NR-9400A (it is capable of recording discs at a maximum speed of 48x), then the reason why the others refused to “accelerate to full speed” is not entirely clear. We will assume that these drives themselves know better what and at what speed they write. It is also worth noting the external MSI CRE52-M - at the very end of the disk there was some kind of “jump”. However, later the same disc was recorded without any problems. The “fastest” representative of the review, Mitsumi CR-485GTE, coped with a 52x drive at the lowest speed relative to other drives - 16x.

CD-R Verbatim 48x:

AOpen CRW-5232

ASUS CRW-5232AS

BenQ 5232P

LG GCE-8522B

Mitsumi CR-485GTE

MSI CR52-M

MSI CRE52-M

NEC NR-9400A

Plextor PlexWriter Premium

Sony CRX230E

As for the Verbatim disk, the high quality of its production was once again confirmed. Seven out of ten presented drives were able to record it at their maximum speed - 52x. However, on the other hand, everyone else burned it at a lower speed than it is certified. Otherwise, there are no complaints. We can only once again note the device from Mitsumi, which refused to write even a higher-quality disc at the maximum speed declared for itself - 54x.

AOpen CRW-5232

ASUS CRW-5232AS

BenQ 5232P

LG GCE-8522B

Mitsumi CR-485GTE

MSI CR52-M

MSI CRE52-M

NEC NR-9400A

Plextor PlexWriter Premium

Sony CRX230E

800 MB disks are not in very wide demand in our market, however, their presence should not be ignored. Moreover, it is always useful to know how drives can handle non-standard media. As you can see from the graphs, only the LG GCE-8522B was able to correctly recognize an 800 MB disk. Everyone else stubbornly “claimed” that no more than 700 MB (±3 MB) would fit on a “blank”. However, all the drives were able to write 800 MB to this disk without any problems, despite all the assurances of the Nero Burning Rom program that overburning disks is “not good.” I would also like to assure you that there were no problems reading them on other drives.

I would also like to note both devices from MSI - they were able to burn a certified 24x disc at speeds of 32x (external MSI CRE52-M) and 52x (MSI CR52-M).

CD-R Philips 48x (800 MB):

AOpen CRW-5232

ASUS CRW-5232AS

BenQ 5232P

LG GCE-8522B

Mitsumi CR-485GTE

MSI CR52-M

MSI CRE52-M

NEC NR-9400A

Plextor PlexWriter Premium

Sony CRX230E

In addition to the 800 MB 24x e-ProFormance drives, the testing also included Philips' more expensive 800 MB drives certified for 48x recording. And I want to say right away that not all drives were able to record it at such a speed. Representatives from AOpen, ASUS, MSI (external and internal) and Sony coped with the task “as it should.” Moreover, AOpen CRW-5232 and MSI CRE52-M completed burning (or rather, its emulation) at a speed of 52x. As for the LG drive, it was again the only one that correctly recognized the volume of inserted media. It is also worth noting that the “fastest” drive (Mitsumi) coped with recording a Philips disc again at the lowest speed among all others - 16x.

CD-RW e-ProFormance 12x:

AOpen CRW-5232

ASUS CRW-5232AS

BenQ 5232P

LG GCE-8522B

Mitsumi CR-485GTE

MSI CR52-M

MSI CRE52-M

NEC NR-9400A

Plextor PlexWriter Premium

Sony CRX230E

All drives produced by e-ProFormance represent budget storage media in our review. After all, any drive must be capable of recording not only high-quality and expensive discs, but also cheaper ones, the demand for which, as we know, is often higher. It is for this reason that in addition to the three rewritable Verbatim discs, a 12x disc from e-ProFormance was added.

Now comments on the recording emulation graphs. Actually, nothing interesting can be said about them. You just have to pay attention to drives from LG, NEC and Plextor - they recorded the test disc at 10x speed. And this is a clear indicator that subsequently a 32x Verbatim disc will not be able to be recorded. And if this is nothing unusual for LG and NEC (their maximum burning speed of rewritable media is 24x), then Plextor should have been able to cope with all the “blanks” without any problems.

CD-RW Verbatim 10x:

AOpen CRW-5232

ASUS CRW-5232AS

BenQ 5232P

LG GCE-8522B

Mitsumi CR-485GTE

MSI CR52-M

MSI CRE52-M

NEC NR-9400A

Plextor PlexWriter Premium

Sony CRX230E

All drives that support rewriting 32x RW disks were able to write 10x Verbatim media at 12x speed. Which once again indicates the quality of manufacturing of this company’s products.

CD-RW Verbatim 24x:

AOpen CRW-5232

ASUS CRW-5232AS

BenQ 5232P

LG GCE-8522B

Mitsumi CR-485GTE

MSI CR52-M

MSI CRE52-M

NEC NR-9400A

Plextor PlexWriter Premium

Sony CRX230E

Absolutely all review participants coped with dubbing a 24x Verbatim disc without any problems. The average speed and recording time for all drives are approximately equal.

CD-RW Verbatim 32x:

AOpen CRW-5232

ASUS CRW-5232AS

BenQ 5232P

LG GCE-8522B

Mitsumi CR-485GTE

MSI CR52-M

MSI CRE52-M

NEC NR-9400A

Plextor PlexWriter Premium

Sony CRX230E

Both Plextor drives, like BenQ, refused to write to a 32x Verbatim "blank" and gave an error. It is likely that the problem will be fixed with the release of new firmware. As for NEC and LG, as noted above, their characteristics are not capable of recording such discs.

It was very surprising to observe such a phenomenon as burning a rewritable CD, certified for recording only at 32x, with a drive that does not support such speeds. This all concerns the representative from NEC, NR-9400A. He did an excellent job recording the above-mentioned media at 16x speed.

Nero CD-DVD Speed: Overburning Test

Drive unit	Digitex 52x	Verbatim 48x	e-ProFormance 24x (800 MB)	Philips 48x (800 MB)
AOpen CRW-5232	82:39.23 (726 MB)	81:01.13 (713 MB)	95:50.17 (845 MB)	92:19.01 (811 MB)
ASUS CRW-5232AS	84:16.35 (740 MB)	83:28.09 (731 MB)	95:06.47 (835 MB)	93:06.29 (818 MB)
BenQ 5232P	80:07.45 (704 MB)	81:49.09 (719 MB)	80:07.45 (704 MB)	92:36.30 (813 MB)
LG GCE-8522B	93:37.35 (822 MB)	93:34.32 (822 MB)	93:47.08 (824 MB)	--:--.--
Mitsumi CR-485GTE	82:41.42 (726 MB)	83:34.18 (734 MB)	95:15.31 (837 MB)	93:02.13 (817 MB)
MSI CR52-M	82:41.42 (726 MB)	83:34.18 (734 MB)	95:15.31 (837 MB)	93:02.13 (817MB)
MSI CRE52-M	82:32.33 (725 MB)	83:01.72 (729 MB)	95:02.25 (835 MB)	109:35.42 (958 MB)
NEC NR-9400A	83:53.29 (737 MB)	85:42.60 (753 MB)	99:47.08 (874 MB)	96:43.54 (850 MB)
Plextor Premium	83:19.52 (732 MB)	83:59.60 (733 MB)	96:55.18 (847 MB)	94:05.24 (822 MB)
Sony CRX230E	82:48.66 (725 MB)	81:00.42 (711 MB)	95:05.53 (835 MB)	91:55.54 (806 MB)

It is quite difficult to determine a clear winner in this test - all drives are approximately at the same level. And again, it is worth noting the LG GCE-8522B - only it was able to correctly recognize all 800 MB disks, and only it was able to write more than 800 MB of information to both 700 MB disks. On the other hand, the drive failed this test with the 800 MB Philips disk, the program produced the following error:

We should also mention the external drive MSI CRE52-M - it can record up to 950 MB of information on an 800 MB Philips drive!

To check the quality of disc recording, the KProbe utility version 2.2.3 was used. With its help you can track the level of C1/C2 errors.

CD-R Digitex 52x:

AOpen CRW-5232

ASUS CRW-5232AS

BenQ 5232P

LG GCE-8522B

Mitsumi CR-485GTE

MSI CR52-M

MSI CRE52-M

NEC NR-9400A

Plextor PlexWriter Premium

Sony CRX230E

Judging by the results of this test, the 52x disc from Digitex was the worst recorded by MSI drives. According to the graph, you can observe a very high error level in the second half of the disk. Everything would be fine, but these two drives have a slightly higher price compared to other participants.

As for the most expensive representative of the review, Plextor Premium, this drive took an honorable fourth place. From the end. Of course, the error rate on the disc it records is not very high, but its price is twice as high as all other drives.

The best performance in this test is from ASUS, BenQ, Mitsumi, NEC and Sony.

CD-R Verbatim 48x:

AOpen CRW-5232

ASUS CRW-5232AS

BenQ 5232P

LG GCE-8522B

Mitsumi CR-485GTE

MSI CR52-M

MSI CRE52-M

NEC NR-9400A

Plextor PlexWriter Premium

Sony CRX230E

Very contradictory results can be observed in this test. On average, all drives showed poorer recording quality compared to the Digitex disc. However, some still improved their results - LG, external and internal MSI. The worst results were from Mitsumi, MSI, Plextor and Sony. The best results again come from BenQ, NEC and ASUS drives. However, a fairly low error rate can also be observed with LG.

CD-R e-ProFormance 24x (800 MB):

AOpen CRW-5232

ASUS CRW-5232AS

BenQ 5232P

LG GCE-8522B

Mitsumi CR-485GTE

MSI CR52-M

MSI CRE52-M

NEC NR-9400A

Plextor PlexWriter Premium

Sony CRX230E

Now let's look at the recording quality of 800 MB blanks. It is immediately worth noting the huge level of errors at the beginning of the disk of the AOpen CRW-5232 drive. Otherwise, all other participants in the review showed very good results on average. However, although MSI drives turned out to have a significantly lower error rate, it is still higher than the others. Plextor Premium is again fourth and again from the bottom. Everyone else has very good results.

CD-R Philips 48x (800 MB):

AOpen CRW-5232

ASUS CRW-5232AS

BenQ 5232P

LG GCE-8522B

Mitsumi CR-485GTE

MSI CR52-M

MSI CRE52-M

NEC NR-9400A

Plextor PlexWriter Premium

Sony CRX230E

It seems that all drives are partial to Philips drives. The average error rate is the lowest among all other drives used. Oddly enough, even recording devices from MSI showed quite good results for themselves. Otherwise, for the most part, the number of errors for all participants is approximately the same. Sony and NEC drives only let us down a little.

CD-RW e-ProFormance 12x:

AOpen CRW-5232

ASUS CRW-5232AS

BenQ 5232P

LG GCE-8522B

Mitsumi CR-485GTE

MSI CR52-M

MSI CRE52-M

NEC NR-9400A

Plextor PlexWriter Premium

Sony CRX230E

As you know, rewritable discs are always written at a lower speed and read worse than write-once discs. The error rate on such media is also usually higher than that of CD-R discs. This is confirmed by the diagrams shown here.

So, on an e-ProFormance CD-RW disc, which is certified to write at 12x speed, many drives show very high error rates. The worst results can be observed with the Sony CRX230E. The diagram for the beginning of the MSI CR52-M drive also looks very bad, but towards the end the number of errors drops to the level shown by other drives. For the rest of the review participants, the picture is approximately the same: a high level of errors at the beginning and end of the disk and a lower one in the middle.

Separately, it is worth noting the Plextor Premium drive. This time he is the first. And from the beginning. The number of errors on the disc he recorded is record low - about the same as on well-recorded CD-R blanks - on average 10-30 times lower than others.

CD-RW Verbatim 10x:

AOpen CRW-5232

ASUS CRW-5232AS

BenQ 5232P

LG GCE-8522B

Mitsumi CR-485GTE

MSI CR52-M

MSI CRE52-M

NEC NR-9400A

Plextor PlexWriter Premium

Sony CRX230E

Strangely, the number of errors on a Verbatim disk is on average higher than that of e-ProFormance. However, it is possible that such indicators were “achieved” due to some drives recording this disc at a speed of 12x, instead of the required 10x.

You should immediately pay attention to the burner from Sony - the level of errors is simply enormous. The worst result in the entire review. The rest showed approximately the same results, with the exception of drives from MSI and ASUS. CRE52-M also has a lot of errors. ASUS shows poor results only at the beginning and end of the disc.

And again I was pleasantly surprised by Plextor - the error rate shown is very low compared to the others.

CD-RW Verbatim 24x:

AOpen CRW-5232

ASUS CRW-5232AS

BenQ 5232P

LG GCE-8522B

Mitsumi CR-485GTE

MSI CR52-M

MSI CRE52-M

NEC NR-9400A

Plextor PlexWriter Premium

Sony CRX230E

The results for the 24x Verbatim CD-RW disc are on average better than for the previous two. Sony again has the worst result, but without a doubt it is better than the 10x Verbatim. The remaining drives have very good performance. Some (AOpen, LG, both MSI, NEC and Plextor) have a "spike" of errors at the beginning of the disk and a fairly low level in the rest of the disk.

CD-RW Verbatim 32x:

AOpen CRW-5232

ASUS CRW-5232AS

BenQ 5232P

LG GCE-8522B

Mitsumi CR-485GTE

MSI CR52-M

MSI CRE52-M

NEC NR-9400A

Plextor PlexWriter Premium

Sony CRX230E

It is pleasant to state the fact that, compared to other rewritable discs, the Verbatim 32x "blank" was received very well by the drives. Naturally, this only applies to those drives that were able to record it.

I would like to note the device from Sony - this time it showed one of the best results. The drive from ASUS also showed good results.

As for Plextor and BenQ, as mentioned above, they were unable to burn this disc. But, we believe that such a problem can be solved by simply changing the firmware.

Burning time of test CDs

CD-R discs:

Drive unit	Digitex 52x	Verbatim 48x	e-ProFormance 24x (800 MB)	Philips 48x (800 MB)
AOpen CRW-5232	2:29	2:46	5:24	2:51
ASUS CRW-5232AS	2:46	2:50	5:56	2:54
BenQ 5232P	4:00	2:35	4:44	3:05
LG GCE-8522B	5:37	6:19	6:25	3:38
Mitsumi CR-485GTE	5:20	3:45	6:00	5:00
MSI CR52-M	2:50	2:46	3:03	3:11
MSI CRE52-M	2:52	3:16	3:32	3:23
NEC NR-9400A	2:41	3:15	6:13	4:40
Plextor Premium	3:44	5:34	5:06	4:49
Sony CRX230E	3:21	2:40	5:32	-:--

As can be seen from the table, the drives from AOpen and both MSIs were the fastest to write CD-R discs. The slowest were the LG GCE-8522B and the fastest according to the stated characteristics - the Mitsumi CR-485GTE.

It is worth noting that when burning an 800 MB Philips disc on a Sony CRX230E drive, the Nero Burning Rom program generated the following error:

However, the disc subsequently passed the KProbe test.

CD-RW discs:

Drive unit	e-ProFormance 12x	Verbatim 10x	Verbatim 24x	Verbatim 32x
AOpen CRW-5232	7:13	7:16	3:49	3:07
ASUS CRW-5232AS	7:14	7:15	3:58	3:18
BenQ 5232P	7:32	7:22	5:04	-:--
LG GCE-8522B	9:00	9:08	4:41	-:--
Mitsumi CR-485GTE	7:21	7:28	3:50	3:11
MSI CR52-M	7:21	7:15	3:53	3:14
MSI CRE52-M	7:25	7:14	3:53	3:13
NEC NR-9400A	8:31	7:16	4:20	-:--
Plextor Premium	8:44	8:36	4:08	-:--
Sony CRX230E	7:21	7:06	3:48	3:18

I think this table does not require any explanation. The writing time of rewritable discs is approximately the same for all drives.

CD-ROM Drive Analyzer

AOpen CRW-5232

ASUS CRW-5232AS

BenQ 5232P

LG GCE-8522B

Mitsumi CR-485GTE

MSI CR52-M

MSI CRE52-M

NEC NR-9400A

Plextor PlexWriter Premium

Sony CRX230E

AOpen CRW-5232

ASUS CRW-5232AS

BenQ 5232P

LG GCE-8522B

Mitsumi CR-485GTE

MSI CR52-M

MSI CRE52-M

NEC NR-9400A

Plextor PlexWriter Premium

Sony CRX230E

CD-R 800 MB:

AOpen CRW-5232

ASUS CRW-5232AS

BenQ 5232P

LG GCE-8522B

Mitsumi CR-485GTE

MSI CR52-M

MSI CRE52-M

NEC NR-9400A

Plextor PlexWriter Premium

Sony CRX230E

AOpen CRW-5232

ASUS CRW-5232AS

BenQ 5232P

LG GCE-8522B

Mitsumi CR-485GTE

MSI CR52-M

MSI CRE52-M

NEC NR-9400A

Plextor PlexWriter Premium

Sony CRX230E

AOpen CRW-5232

ASUS CRW-5232AS

BenQ 5232P

LG GCE-8522B

Mitsumi CR-485GTE

MSI CR52-M

MSI CRE52-M

NEC NR-9400A

Plextor PlexWriter Premium

Sony CRX230E

This test clearly shows that the Plextor drive has the lowest seek time. We are also pleased to note the fact that this search time corresponds to the stated one (<65 мс) - для штампованного компакт-диска оно составило 64 мс. В остальном же все участники обзора показали одиноково хорошие результаты.

AOpen CRW-5232

ASUS CRW-5232AS

BenQ 5232P

LG GCE-8522B

Mitsumi CR-485GTE

MSI CR52-M

MSI CRE52-M

NEC NR-9400A

Plextor PlexWriter Premium

Sony CRX230E

The Plextor and AOpen drives showed slightly uncertain reading at the end of the test CD-R disc. The results for other drives are equally good and require no comment.

CD-R 800 MB:

AOpen CRW-5232

Nero CD-DVD Speed: Disk Quality Check

Drive unit	Quality Score	Speed	C2 Errors (Total)
AOpen CRW-5232	0%	32.60x	1745
ASUS CRW-5232AS	0%	32.20x	606
BenQ 5232P	0%	32.60x	1923
LG GCE-8522B	-	-	-
Mitsumi CR-485GTE	-	-	-
MSI CR52-M	0%	4x	44816
MSI CRE52-M (40x)	0%	32.82x	349190
NEC NR-9400A	-	-	-
Plextor Premium	100%	4x	0
Sony CRX230E	94%	4x	0

Only two drives passed this test to the end: Sony and Plextor. Moreover, Plextor Premium passed it, without exaggeration, perfectly. The rest either simply did not finish it, or “refused” to take it altogether. In particular, this applies to the drive from Mitsumi. After running the test, the program happily froze and did not respond to any requests. At the same time, the drive did not show any signs of activity. The same applies to the LG GCE-8522B. It normally recognized the inserted disk, but after the test began, it did nothing with it - the disk was stopped and absolutely nothing happened. As for the NEC NR-9400A, the program generated the following message when trying to start testing:

Nero CD-DVD Speed: Advanced DAE Quality Test

The Advanced DAE Quality Test was used to determine how well the drives can extract tracks from audio CDs.

Drive unit	Average Speed	Data Errors	Sync Errors	Quality Score	On the Fly Copying	Offset Bytes (Samples)	Read Leadin	Read Leadout	Read CD Text	Read Subchannel Data
AOpen CRW-5232	36.17x	0	0	100	16x	-2448 (-612)	+	+	+	+
ASUS CRW-5232AS	37.45x	94	0	100	16x	-2448 (-612)	+	-	+	+
BenQ 5232P	35.18x	0	0	100	16x	0 (0)	+	-	+	+
LG GCE-8522B	27.28x	0	0	100	16x	2636 (659)	-	-	+	+
Mitsumi CR-485GTE	29.29x	0	0	100	16x	2812 (703)	-	-	+	+
MSI CR52-M	29.81x	0	0	100	16x	-96 (-24)	+	+	+	+
MSI CRE52-M	29.51x	0	0	100	16x	-96 (-24)	+	-	+	+
NEC NR-9400A	29.59x	2	0	100	16x	460 (115)	+	-	+	+
Plextor Premium	37.17x	0	0	100	16x	0 (0)	+	+	+	+
Sony CRX230E	29.25x	0	0	100	16x	-96 (-24)	+	+	+	+

Based on the results obtained, we can say that all drives will cope more or less well with the task of accurately copying audio data. However, the Offset parameter, which allows you to determine the positioning accuracy on audio discs, does not have the same values on all discs. You should immediately pay attention to BenQ and Plextor drives - they have the best values for this indicator. Also, good values can be seen from both MSI and Sony.

It is also worth noting that not all drives can work with specific service information. Here the best results were demonstrated by AOpen CRW-5232, MSI CR52-M, Plextor Premium and Sony CRX230E. As for the rest, their ability to accurately extract data from AudioCD is lower.

Nero CD-DVD Speed: Advanced DAE Error Correction Test

This test shows how well the drives can handle C2 errors, if at all.

Drive unit	C2 Accuracy	Quality Score	C2 Errors	C2 Missed	Compare Errors	Sync Errors
AOpen CRW-5232	6.55%	0.0	2118311	6969015	7457565	28639
ASUS CRW-5232AS	40.46%	0.0	7554202	10743156	10842871	14321
BenQ 5232P	20.65%	0.0	6754272	8747652	12862751	9674
LG GCE-8522B	51.91%	0.0	9697369	7719346	16050589	5536
Mitsumi CR-485GTE	46.81%	0.0	366962694	144907434	272430710	314356
MSI CR52-M	72.25%	0.0	5301568	1976819	7124327	5880
MSI CRE52-M	83.81%	0.0	75554146	14102357	87113312	41201
NEC NR-9400A	0.0%	0.0	0	12322466	12322466	5897
Plextor Premium	16.37%	0.0	8531797	42497860	50816663	46275
Sony CRX230E	70.37%	0.0	11772766	3111865	14530691	5753

Paradoxically, absolutely all drives could not cope with the test disk. Most likely, the reason is too severe mechanical damage on its surface. Also worth noting are NEC and Mitsumi drives. The first one cannot work with C2 errors at all, and the second one showed a record high number of them.

Exact Audio Copy

The EAC program is used in our review to check the quality and speed of extracting audio tracks. Let me remind you that EAC uses all the capabilities of the drive to produce the most accurate copies. Its functionality also allows you to define such drive parameters as data caching, “accurate flow” and the ability to work with C2 errors.

Drive unit	DAE Time	Caching	Accurate Stream	C2 Error Info
AOpen CRW-5232	11:32	-	+	+
ASUS CRW-5232AS	46:39	-	+	+
BenQ 5232P	5:40	+	+	+
LG GCE-8522B	13:23	-	+	-
Mitsumi CR-485GTE	6:32	-	+	-
MSI CR52-M	2:47	-	+	+
MSI CRE52-M	4:45	+	+	+
NEC NR-9400A	16:56	-	+	-
Plextor Premium	22:25	+	+	+
Sony CRX230E	6:26	+	+	+

As can be seen from the table, all drives support the “precise stream” function. As for caching, this feature is only available to BenQ, external MSI, Plextor and Sony drives. The picture is almost the same with C2 errors - only AOpen, ASUS, BenQ, both MSI, Plextor and Sony can recognize them.

Drives from BenQ, MSI and Sony coped with the task of extracting data from an audio disc the fastest, which, in my opinion, is a little strange - these drives are capable of working with C2 errors, and this should have slightly reduced the copying speed. The slowest result was demonstrated by a representative from ASUS.

Having carried out all the tests, unfortunately, it is impossible to single out a clear winner. All drives have their advantages and disadvantages. However, if Plextor Premium had performed at least a little better in recording tests and had cost less, then we could have easily given it the title “Our Choice”.

Also, drives from MSI did not fully live up to expectations. Their recording quality is, on average, slightly worse than that of other drives. However, these shortcomings are offset by one of the best write/read speeds and minimal noise characteristics.

As for the recording quality, after a series of tests, a new firmware version was posted on the official Microstar website, which solves problems with not very good recording quality in MSI drives.

I would like to separately mention the drive from ASUS. Considering its cost, it showed very good results, for which it receives the “Best price/quality ratio” mark.

And now about each drive separately:

AOpen CRW-5232

In general, impressions of this decision were positive. The drive wrote all types of media without any problems. Moreover, he did this at a very good speed relative to the other participants in the review. As for the recording quality, it is generally not bad, however, the e-ProFormance 800 MB CD-R disc was recorded with a large number of errors. The quality of burning rewritable discs with the CRW-5232 is generally a little worse than with the others, but still the result is not the worst. There are also no special complaints about reading optical media.

ASUS CRW-5232AS

So, as noted above, the drive performed very well. Good write quality (one of the best in testing) and good burn/read speeds make this drive a better buy. It is worth mentioning the low noise level and shortened body.

BenQ 5232P

BenQ 5232P performed very well. The recording quality is excellent. However, the ideal picture was spoiled by the inability to record a rewritable disc at 32x speed. Let's hope that the new firmware will solve this problem. There are also no special complaints about the quality of reading. In general, we can say that the device from BenQ justifies its cost.

LG GCE-8522B

I would like to immediately note the “jagged” recording schedule for all media. However, the drive can burn all discs with the exception of 32x CD-RW Verbatim. Also, a very good result was shown in the reburning test of blanks. The recording quality is generally good. Reading is also not satisfactory. But, on the other hand, the drive could not pass the Nero CD-DVD Speed: Disk Quality Check test, or rather did not even start it.

Mitsumi CR-485GTE

To be honest, it was a lot of fun to see how the fastest drive according to its stated characteristics showed the lowest results in terms of writing speed (this only applies to CD-R blanks). However, the recording quality turned out to be at a quite acceptable level. As for reading, the drive refused to read the 800 MB disk, interrupting the test at the 80th minute, and this does it no credit at all. And finally, it should be noted that the noise level is very high. Despite the fairly strong hum from the entire system, the drive was perfectly audible from another room.

MSI CR52-M

The write/read speed of this drive turned out to be one of the best in the review! The reading quality and noise characteristics were also impressive. It seems to us that the originality of the drive design, which is achieved due to the replaceable panels included in the delivery kit, is why the drive receives the award for the best design. The only disappointing thing is that despite the good design and support for many proprietary technologies, the drive did not perform well in recording quality tests. However, the new firmware already mentioned above should solve these problems.

MSI CRE52-M

After the tests, we can say that an external CD-RW drive from MSI can serve as a replacement for a desktop one. The speed characteristics are exactly the same as those of internal models, moreover, the burn time is also one of the best. But, as we already wrote above, the recording quality of the drive is by no means the best (which is again resolvable in light of the released firmware for MSI drives). It is also worth noting that the CRE52-M refused to record on 4x rewritable discs from SKY and TDK. Which cannot be considered one of its advantages. The quality of reading is at a fairly high level. The noise level was also pleasing - this drive turned out to be the quietest in the review.

NEC NR-9400A

There was nothing special or outstanding in the results shown by the NEC drive. However, nothing bad either. The only complaints I have are the slightly uncertain reading of low-quality discs. Otherwise, it's an average drive with an average price.

Plextor PlexWriter Premium

As noted above, the drive from the Japanese company Plextor is the most expensive in the review - about twice as expensive as all the others. However, we believe that he is not earning his money at all. Yes, good equipment, proprietary technologies and software are always good, but for that kind of money there should not be any problems with the quality of recording and reading discs. And in terms of burning discs, the drive did not perform at its best. However, it’s nice to note that this drive reads discs better than anyone else. We can safely say that he reads everything! Even handwritten text from paper ;). But still, if it weren’t for these blatant “blunders,” we could safely give the “plekstor” “Our choice.”

Sony CRX230E

The drive is an OEM version of the LiteOn device. I think based on its results one can judge the capabilities of this company’s drives. The recording quality of CD-R discs is at a fairly high level. However, the drive failed when it came to writing rewritable media - it had the highest error rate among the rest. The CRX230E reads discs quite well; even a low-quality disc was read a little worse than Plextor did. I think the drive can be recommended for purchase - it fully justifies its cost.

GreenLine for the MSI CR52-M, MSI CRE52-M drives provided for testing;

Rongbuk for providing AOpen CRW-5232 and NEC NR-9400A drives for testing;

CD-Life for providing ASUS CRW-5232AS, BenQ 5232P, LG GCE-8522B drives for testing;

UltraPrice for the provided Plextor PlexWriter Premium and Sony CRX230E drives.

An optical drive is a data storage device that reads and writes optically. The optical drive uses flat multilayer disks with a diameter of 8 or 12 mm as media. Among the “optics” there are several main types of these devices: CD-ROM, CD-RW, DVD-ROM, CD-RW-DVD, DVD-RW. These are not all of the listed types of optical drives, there is also Blu-ray and so on, however, we do not set ourselves the goal of talking about all devices of this type, but only want to touch on the main ones that are present on the market and are relevant and not so relevant to date. Again, it’s pointless to touch on the topic of Blu-ray, etc., there is a huge amount of information on this type of device on the Internet. In addition, Blu-ray drives are quite expensive today and are not in great demand. When these optical drives become available to the average consumer, we will definitely consider them as a potential purchase option.

We want to start our story with a story about the types of optical drives.

Types of optical drives

CD-ROM

The simplest of devices of this type. This drive can only read regular CDs. The speed of most “modern” CD-ROMs reaches 52x, less often the maximum for this type of device is 56x. We'll talk more about speed below. Today, the CD-ROM drive is obsolete and is of interest only in the most exceptional cases. Take, for example, the same office and a limited budget. It's hard to fit a CD-ROM even here. Typically, offices have a local network, and buying one DVD-ROM drive for one of the personal computers is more than realistic. There is no attractiveness in CD-ROMs; CDs are not much cheaper than regular DVDs, and their capacity is much less.

CD-RW

The next stage in the development of optical drives. CD-RW allows you not only to read information from regular CDs, but also to write it to CD-R and CD-RW matrices. The relevance of CD-RW is also in question, only in the office - and then in exceptional cases.

DVD-ROM

Another stage in the evolution of optical drives - now you have at your disposal a device that can read not only regular CDs, but also DVDs. The speed formula of the device is as follows: 16x for DVD and 52x for CD. The prospect of buying a DVD-ROM is much more promising compared to its progenitor, the CD-ROM: there are obvious examples of using this device to download any information or software from DVD and CD media.

DVD-CD-RW Combo

The so-called Combo drive, which combines the functions of devices such as DVD-ROM and CD-RW and, accordingly, can write CD-R and CD-RW discs and read both regular CDs and DVDs.

Some time ago, DVD-CD-RW was the most popular optical drive, but its prospects are questionable. These devices are practically never produced, although there is a very small supply on the market. We see some prospect of using DVD-CD-RW in an office or educational institution, when you need to burn CD-R and CD-RW discs and load information from CD and DVD media, but the budget is very limited, and you want to save at least a small amount money.

DVD-RW

DVD-RW is the undoubted leader in the optical drive market today. These devices are the most popular in the Russian information technology market. DVD-RW allows you not only to read CD/DVD discs, but also to write both regular CD-R/CD-RW media and much more capacious DVD-R/DVD-RW/DVD+R/DVD+RW. And in the case of a Super-Multi drive, DVD-RAM will also be added to support a significant list of formats.

The prospects and relevance of this type of device are beyond doubt. For a price of about 40-55 USD, you get an optical drive that has sufficient functionality for most consumers. It's hard to imagine a modern home personal computer without DVD-RW.

DVD-RW is the most attractive device today in terms of format support, capabilities and price. If you are going to purchase an optical drive, then it should undoubtedly be a DVD-RW.

From the type we smoothly move on to the form factor of optical drives.

Form factor

Optical drives are available in several form factors. On the Russian market you can find these devices in both internal and external versions.

The most common are internal drives, which are installed in the 5.25-inch bay of a regular desktop case. Such devices are the most popular and in demand on the market at the moment.

5.25" DVD-RW drive

Among such devices, two so-called subtypes can be distinguished, which are characterized by the possibility of loading: tray and slot. In the first case, the CD is placed in the eject tray; in the second, it is simply inserted into the slot, and the device takes it away.

Optical drives designed for laptops are also available. Their form factor can also be described as internal, but they are made in the so-called Slim design, which, in general, is not surprising, given the size of modern mobile personal computers.

Laptop DVD-RW drive

As is the case with 5.25-inch devices, “Slim-optics” has several options for loading media into the drive: slot and tray. The principle is the same, you just have to make a reservation that the tray in Slim drives does not come out automatically, but only opens slightly and is subsequently pulled out manually.

Interface

Internal drives are equipped with two interfaces: Parallel ATA and Serial ATA. If you have enough Serial ATA ports, you can buy an appropriate optical drive, but you won't notice much of a difference in the device's performance. Still, there are pleasant bonuses in the case of using a serial interface: a thin Serial ATA cable is more convenient to install in a case than 40 or 80-wire IDE analogues, and the prospect of an upgrade is not scary: it is very unpleasant that one fine day, after changing the system board, you will have to buy a new drive. The trend towards reducing IDE connectors in modern motherboards is obvious; chipset manufacturers no longer support Parallel ATA; motherboard manufacturers themselves do this, equipping their products with chips from third-party manufacturers.

In addition to internal optical drives, there are also external ones. These devices are connected to a personal computer via a USB or FireWire interface. The design of such devices is quite diverse - there are large, angular models in the “square-practical-gut” style with an external power supply that require additional power from the mains, and there are also very stylish Slim models that can work without additional power, content with the fact that available in USB 2.0.

Slim model of DVD-RW drive

The market share of external optical drives is small. As a rule, these devices are used in conjunction with single-spindle laptops, which have no drive at all. However, it is worth mentioning that there are few such laptops.

Having considered the types and form factors of optical drives, it’s worth talking a little about formats.

A little about formats and speed

You may have already noticed that the read/write speed of optical drives is measured in so-called Xs: 1x, 16x, 48x. It is worth clarifying a little and linking the so-called X to a more specific parameter that measures speed. So, for ordinary CD media the speed of one X is 150 KB/s, and for DVD discs this parameter is already 1.385 MB/s. One more feature can be noted in reading CDs and DVDs. Thus, the latter rotate at a speed three times higher than the reading speed of conventional CD media. Using arithmetic, it is easy to see that 16x for DVD is similar to 48x for CD.

We've more or less figured out the speed, now let's look at the main formats that modern optical drives read/write.

CD- the most ordinary stamped CDs that are used exclusively for reading. Music, software and other information - you could have seen all these CDs repeatedly in various stores. The maximum capacity of this type of media is 700 MB. Speed characteristics range from 40x to 56x. It is worth noting that for most CDs this parameter is 40x, 40x or so; 52x and 56x are rare. At such high speeds, optical drives simply howl, especially if the media itself is of poor quality.

CD-R– CDs for one-time recording of information. The speed characteristics for the reading parameter are similar to their CD counterparts. As for recording, the maximum speed at which a standard 700 MB CD-R can be written is about 40x and 48x, in practice this is 3-4 minutes. Intermediate speed values are also available. That is, if your optical drive does not support such high write speeds or you yourself, for some reason, do not want to record matrices at the maximum possible x, you can limit yourself to 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 24, 32x.

CD-RW– rewritable CDs with a resource of about 1000 times. The capacity is the same as CD and CD-R, but the reading speed is slightly lower: most media are read at 32x and 24x speed. CD-RWs are clearly tied to a specific write/rewrite speed: CD-RW (1-4x), Hi-Speed CD-RW (4-12x), Ultra Hi-Speed CD-RW (12-24x) and Ultra Hi-Speed+ CD-RW (24-32x). As you can see, the speed flexibility of CD-R is not here, but do not be upset about this, modern optical drives support maximum write/rewrite speeds for CD-RW and are backward compatible with slower matrices.

DVD-ROM– stamped DVDs. Such media can be found in any video store that sells films. There are both single-layer and double-layer media on sale, which differ in capacity: 4.7 GB (single-layer) and 8.5 GB (double-layer). The maximum reading speed is 16x.

DVD-R and DVD+R–DVD matrices for one-time recording of information with a capacity of 4.7 GB. In terms of reading speed, such CDs are similar to their stamped counterparts, 16x is the maximum; if the optical drive is old, then it can read DVD-R and DVD+R at lower speeds: 8x, 10x. There are practically no differences between plus-discs and minus-discs, these designations remained from the time of the format war, today all this is no longer relevant, and modern optical drives support both plus and minus discs.

The maximum recording speed of these media is about 16x, which corresponds to a time period of 6.5 minutes. However, the speed flexibility of CD-R is inherent in both DVD-R and DVD+R, so you can record these discs at speeds below the maximum 16x: 1x, 2x, 4x, 8x.

DVD-R DL and DVD+R DL– These compact discs are similar to DVD-R and DVD+R, but have not one layer, but two, and, as a result, their capacity is about 8.5 GB. In terms of read and write speeds, they are significantly inferior to their single-layer ancestors: reading – 8x, and in most cases it is 4-6x, writing – 8x for DVD+R DL and 4x for DVD-R DL.

A big step forward in its time was the appearance of storage devices on recordable and then rewritable optical media. They had significantly greater functionality compared to the standard CD drives that were familiar at that time. True, their rapid spread in system units was hampered by the high price of such models. As time passed, the technologies implemented in CD-RW drives were constantly improved, and the cost of drives steadily decreased. The latter process occurred at a much faster pace compared to classic CD-ROM drives. The consequence of this is that the price gap between the two types of drives is currently about $30, which is no longer a serious obstacle to their purchase by most users. The ability to burn and rewrite CDs on CD-RW models is worth the money spent on them. It is for these reasons that an increasing number of buyers immediately prefer to purchase CD-RW drives. At the same time, those users who have CD-ROM drives replace them with models with recording capabilities or install the latter additionally to work in tandem. Looking through the price lists of computer companies, you can notice that in terms of the number of offers for sale, CD-RW drives are beginning to outstrip classic models. This is the best evidence of the growing popularity of burner drives. On the other hand, it should be noted that CD-RW drives are increasingly being competed by combined models that allow reading DVDs and burning CDs. Constantly improving DVD drives in –RW, +RW, etc. versions are also beginning to play an increasing role in the market for drives with optical media with recording capabilities. But their wider implementation continues to be hampered by the price factor. In our current review, we will focus on more conventional CD-RW drives - ten models from seven manufacturers.

BURN-Proof

One of the problems that owners of older models of CD-RW drives have encountered and continue to periodically encounter is the Buffer Under Run error. The consequence of this is that CD-R blanks are irretrievably damaged during the recording process. This is caused by the fact that the data from the buffer necessary for “burning” the disk begins to be “consumed” faster than it arrives there. As a result, the recording process stops at a certain point and cannot be resumed. In practice, this is caused by the fact that the computer is not able to provide “delivery” of data to the drive buffer faster than they are used in work due to insufficient computer power in general or due to the fact that it uses part of its resources to solve some other problems. parallel tasks. The reason could also be that the write speed of the drive itself was too high. In all cases, the problem began to arise when a certain balance was disturbed between the capabilities of the drive and the computer during operation. The possibility of such a situation hampering the wider promotion of CD-RW drives on the market, which naturally did not suit the developers. And a solution was found.
In 2000, Sanyo proposed Burn-Proof technology (BufeR UndeRun ProoF), which prevented damage to blanks if the buffer was empty. Its meaning is as follows. The drive controller constantly monitors the state of the buffer during the recording process and, if a situation arises when it may be empty, stops recording. The position at which recording was stopped is remembered. Once the level of data in the buffer reaches the required level again, the writing process resumes. The gap (empty area) in the place where recording was stopped is in this case minimized and amounts to several microns, which does not affect the future when reading information from the CD.
Sanyo's innovation was supported by many optical disc drive developers. They use Burn-Proof technology directly in their drives or modified versions of it under their own names. But

Overburn

Remember how one man wanted seven hats made from one skin. Similar desires sometimes seize many users who try, at all costs, to record onto a storage medium a volume of information that exceeds its official capacity. Let's not be too critical - in some cases it is really very disappointing when 5-10 megabytes do not fit on the disk, because of which you will have to take another disc. A way out in such a situation may be to use the Overburn mode, which translated into Russian will sound something like “overburning” or “reburning.” In general, something like that. With its help, you can exceed the manufacturer's capacity limit for the media. The fundamental possibility of this arises due to the fact that according to the Red Book specification for audio discs, at one time it was necessary to have a Lead out zone, which must be recognized by all optical media drives. This 90-second section of digital silence was supposed to inform the drive that all recordings had ended. The Lead out zone is not included in the declared disk volume and, under certain conditions, can be used, allowing you to record an extra 13-15 MB of data. In fact, this value may be even greater, but this can only be determined in practice. Specific numbers will depend on the combination of drive, media, and software used. All drives have different abilities to write to disks a volume of information greater than that provided by the manufacturer due to their hardware capabilities and sometimes due to a specific firmware version. Likewise, media from different manufacturers, despite nominally the same capacity, may actually have different “additional” capacity. In order to perform Overburn, you will also need software that allows this procedure. A good opportunity for this is provided by the popular Nero - Burning Rom program from Ahead Software in our country. To do this, in the Preference option you need to select the Expert Features tab, check the box next to the item allowing Overburn mode and set the maximum recording length. Before trying to randomly “reburn” discs, it’s a good idea to check the media for this possibility using the CD Speed program that comes with Nero. Having decided to write “excess megabytes” to the media, you need to be prepared for the fact that in certain situations you may damage the “blank” or some of the files will not be read. In addition, you must remember that a disc that you successfully “reburned” may not be readable on other drives.

UDF

Very often in life situations arise when, even if you have a burner drive, transferring information to CDs using special programs is not the best solution. It would be much simpler if the user could transfer the data he needed from the computer to optical media in the drive, treating them like regular floppy disks. Probably, guided by approximately the same considerations, the OSTA (Optical Storage Technology Association) organization at one time showed concern for its neighbors and proposed the UDF (Universal Disk Format) specification in 1995, which in turn became an integral part of the ECMA 197 standard. The goal of developing a universal disk format was to maximize data exchange, minimize cost and ease of use. The shadow side of this technical solution is the loss of approximately one-sixth of the storage space for the file system.

Mount Rainier

The Mount Rainier specification was proposed by a group of the same name, which included such well-known manufacturers as Compag, Microsoft, Philips and Sony. The new standard takes its name from Mount Rainier in Oregon, at the foot of which the Microsoft headquarters is located. Another designation for this format is the abbreviation CD-MRW (CD Mount Rainier Rewrite). This new open standard is another step forward from UDF. It should have better support from the operating system and increased compatibility and performance from CD-RW drives. All users will be able to work with files in the usual “drag and drop” mode. Drives that have passed the test for 100% compatibility with the new standard receive the “EASYwrite” logo. Microsoft plans to provide full support for this technology in the next version of its operating system, codenamed “Longhorn.”

The main advantages of Mount Rainier are the following:

Formatting in the background. In order to transfer information to CD-RW using the UDF batch recording method, you must first format the disk. According to the Mount Rainier standard, recording to the media can begin before formatting is completed, which will occur in the background.

CD-RWs can be removed from the drive at any time, even while formatting. The process will continue automatically the next time the disc is loaded into the drive.

Unlike continuous burst write methods, which use data transfer in 64 KB blocks, Mount Rainier is based on working with 2 KB blocks. This significantly increases the efficiency of using disk space and reduces the time required to copy files.

Unlike UDF, which supports defect administration at the software level, the Mount Rainier specification performs this procedure at the hardware level and is assigned to the recorder. The result is freeing up system memory and processing power for other tasks.

ATIP (Absolute Time in Pre-Groove)

All optical CD-R and CD-RW media that go on sale have a special zone on the surface in the non-working area (pre-written section) where some service information recorded by the manufacturer is stored. This area contains information about the manufacturer, batch number and some characteristics of the disc. The latter may include information about the disc type (for example, audio only), dye type, disc capacity, supported write speeds, absolute Lead-in time, the last address where information can be written, manufacturer recommendations for optimal laser power, etc. P. In addition, a special spiral track ensures correct positioning of the recording head and provides synchronization information to the burner drive.
In practice, not only media from the same batch may have slightly different properties from each other, but even the characteristics of the working surface of the disk in different areas may vary slightly. For this reason, many modern drives are not limited to only reading information from ATIP to perform high-quality recording, but use a number of special technologies for this purpose. This is also quite reasonable from the point of view that some of the information in ATIP may not always correspond to reality. This is due to the fact that some manufacturers of “blanks” purchase matrices for their production from other companies, and the information subsequently placed on the disks sold will refer only to the master disk of the company that made it.

Testing methodology

Write drives differ from read-only models by having a large number of additional features. For this reason, their testing is based on a group of tests used for “reading” drives, plus additional tests that serve to determine their “writing” properties.
CD Winbench 99 ver. 1.1.1 of the company was used to determine the CD-ROM WinMark 99 indicator, which reflects the performance of hard drives, and a number of more specific tests that determine the speed of reading data from the surface of the media with a graph, access time and processor load factor. In order to better identify the ability of drives to work with various types of media, copies were made from a branded stamped CD on CD-R and CD-RW discs and all tests were duplicated with their help.
Nero CD Speed was used to perform the vast majority of tests. With its help, a full set of basic tests was carried out with four types of media. Their roles were: a standard stamped disk that comes as an appendix to a computer magazine, a CD-R disk with data recorded using the CD Speed program itself, a CD-RW disk with an Mpeg4 format film recorded on it, and a licensed audio disk. In addition, a number of specialized tests were carried out. Firstly, the drive’s ability to operate in Overburn mode was determined. For this purpose, recording on CD-R media Memorex 8X and TDK 48X was emulated. Secondly, an Advanced DAE Quality Test was carried out using an audio disc specially prepared using the CD Speed program. It allows you to evaluate how well the drive is able to “extract” audio tracks. Thirdly, a CD Quality Test was carried out to determine the ability of drives to work with media that has mechanical damage to the working surface. For this purpose, a specially prepared disc with scratches was used. Fourthly, a recording test (Transfer Rate) was carried out in emulation mode on blank CDR media.
The CD ROM Drive Analyzer utility version 2.32 was used to remove the transfer graph from the surface of disks (stamped, CD-R, CD-RW).
The CD DAE program was used to determine the speed and quality of extracting audio tracks from an audio disc.
Using the CloneCD utility, we determined the time required to create an image from an audio disk on the hard drive and the time required to copy it to CD-RW media.
Sandra 2003 Professional was used to determine the performance index for two pressed CDs. One goes as an attachment to the magazine and the second with a movie in Mpeg4 format.
Nero Burning Rom version 5.5.10.0 was used to determine the time required for the drive to burn Mpeg4 format films onto CD-R and CD-RW media.
Finally, the Nero InCD utility version 3.5.9.1 was used to study the operation of drives with media in burst write mode. The time required to format CD-RW disks according to UDF and Mount Rainier standards, as well as the speed of data transfer to these media from the hard drive, were measured.
In addition to test programs, two information utilities were used - Nero Info Tool version 1.0.3.2 to determine the hardware capabilities of the drives and CD-R Diagnostic version 1.7.2, showing information about the media recorded by the manufacturer.
The list of the above tests does not pretend to be completely comprehensive, nor to be the ultimate truth. You can only take into account those that inspire you with more confidence. All drives were tested in the form in which they reach users (AS IS). This means that the firmware of the drives was not modified, and Plextor models operated in the “default” speed mode specified by the manufacturer.

Test platform configuration:

Motherboard – Elitegroup K7S5A
Processor – Athlon 700 MHz
RAM – 128 MB SDRAM
Graphics adapter – ATI Radeon 8500 64 MB
Hard drive - IBM DTLA 3070 30 GB UDMA/5

All drives were connected to the second IDE channel and operated with UDMA system settings as Master. The operating system was Windows XP with Service Pack 1 installed.
To test the Plextor PX-W4824TU external drive with a USB 2.0 interface, we used the EpoX EP-8K9A motherboard and 128 MB DDR SDRAM. All other elements of the system remained the same.
The absence of data in the tables with final results indicates that this test was not performed or failed for some reason.

Drives reviewed

Technical data table. Part 1

Model	Read/Write and Overwrite modes	Read/Overwrite/Write Speed X	Interface	Buffer size MB
NEC NR-9200A	n/a	40/12/40	ATAPI (E-IDE)	2
SONY CRX175E	n/a	40/24/10	ATAPI (E-IDE)	2
Mitsumi CR-48XETE	n/a	48/12/48	ATAPI (E-IDE)	2
TEAC CD-W548E	CAV and CLV/P-CAV and CLV	48/16/48	ATAPI (E-IDE)	2
Yamaha CRW-F1	CAV	44/24/44	ATAPI (E-IDE)	8
Plextor PX-W4824TA	CAV and CLV/CAV, P-CAV and CLV	48/24/48	ATAPI (E-IDE)	4
Plextor PX-W4824TU	CAV and CLV/CAV, P-CAV and CLV	48/24/48	USB 2.0	4
Plextor PX-W4012TA	CAV/Z-CLV and CLV	40/12/40	ATAPI (E-IDE)	4
ASUS CRW-5224A	CAV/CAV and P-CAV	52/24/52	ATAPI (E-IDE)	2
ASUS CRW-4816A	CAV/P-CAV and CLV	48/16/48	ATAPI (E-IDE)	2

Technical data table. Part 2

Model	Access time ms	Mt support Rainier	Availability of headphone output	Cost $
NEC NR-9200A	n/a	No	No	60
SONY CRX175E	n/a	No	Yes	51
Mitsumi CR-48XETE	n/a	No	Yes	60
TEAC CD-W548E	100 average	Yes	Yes	80
Yamaha CRW-F1	130 average	Yes	Yes	117
Plextor PX-W4824TA	65 average	Yes	Yes	120
Plextor PX-W4824TU	65 average	Yes	Yes	220
Plextor PX-W4012TA	120 average.	No	Yes	120
ASUS CRW-5224A	100 typical	Yes	Yes	83
ASUS CRW-4816A	100 typical	Yes	Yes	70

ASUS CRW-4816A

ASUSTeK has recently begun to pay great attention to the appearance of its products. This is clearly visible in the design of the drive. Everything that could be squeezed out of his image to make him one of the faces of the company was done. The tray contains the name of the manufacturer and the speed characteristics of the model. It also has two thin horizontal grooves stamped on it, improving the aesthetic perception of the drive. The maximum possible functionality of the drive is easy to notice from the front panel. In addition to the obligatory tray eject button, there is also a second one designed for switching between tracks. Both keys are shaped like elegant, thin rectangles. There are also two operating mode indicator lights. The picture is completed by a headphone jack and volume control. The rear side of the drive has a standard appearance with a small addition. In addition to the interface, power, digital and analog audio connectors, as well as a block of pins for setting the operating mode, there is another set of six pins in the left corner, intended for factory testing. The body has four stamped grooves that increase its rigidity.
The drive can read and write discs at speeds up to 48X, and rewrite at speeds up to 16X. The buffer size is standard and equal to 2 MB. The drive implements a number of proprietary technologies. FlextraSpeed is designed to provide high quality recording in situations where the drives used require the use of variable speed. The drive uses this technology to automatically adjust speed depending on the media being written to. The results of its use are maximum use of the drive's capabilities, minimization of CPU usage and improved acoustic characteristics with an extension of the life cycle of the electric motor.
FlextraLink technology is essentially a variation of the BURN-Proof program. It is also designed to prevent media corruption caused by buffer underruns. During recording, the state of the buffer is continuously monitored and if the amount of data in it begins to amount to approximately 1% of the total volume, the process stops and the stopping point is remembered. Once the buffer is full, recording resumes from the last position. FlextraLink uses a minimum amount of system resources and the computer remains usable for other applications.
Another proprietary innovation implemented in the drive is DDSS II (Double Dynamic Suspension System). This is the second generation of anti-vibration system designed to stabilize the drive read head in horizontal and vertical directions, making positioning and focusing more accurate. Another benefit of DDSS II technology is reduced vibration noise and improved disc reading and playback. The system is based on the use of a dynamic mass design.
In addition to the above technologies, we can note the AI Auto Speed Adjustment system implemented in the drive. With its help, the reading speed is automatically adjusted in accordance with the quality of certified media of different formats.
Finally, it is necessary to note the support for the Mount Rainier standard.
The model includes an instruction manual, a quick installation guide, an IDE cable (UDMA/33), an audio cable, a set of mounting screws, a wire extractor, a CD with Nero software and two blank discs (CD-R and CD-RW ). Everything you need to start working fully on the drive after purchase.

ASUS CRW-5224A

The fastest model among the ASUS writing drive family. The design of the drive is completely identical to the previous drive. Nice and original front panel. The wide functionality of the model will appeal to those who like to listen to audio CDs through headphones. Fortunately, in addition to the corresponding connector for connecting them with a volume control, there is also a button for moving from track to track. Two LED indicators make it easier to control operating modes. The ASUS inscription on the tray indicating the speed modes will always allow your friends and acquaintances to understand without words what kind of drive is installed in your computer. On the back of the case there are the usual interfaces for connecting power and IDE cables, digital and analog audio connectors, a block of pins for selecting the operating mode and six additional pins used for factory testing. The body has four stamped grooves that increase its rigidity.
The drive can read and write at high speeds of 52X, and rewrite at speeds up to 24X. The buffer size is 2 MB. There is no difference in technological equipment between this drive and the previous generation CRW-4816A model. The drive features the same proprietary innovations. FlextraSpeed allows you to automatically select the optimal recording speed. FlextraLink technology protects against possible problems associated with buffer underruns. The second generation of DDSS reduces vibration and promotes positioning and focusing accuracy. AI Auto Speed Adjustment Technology allows the drive to automatically select the optimal reading speed. Mount Rainier technology will allow you to work with media like regular floppy disks.
The model includes an instruction manual, a quick installation guide, an IDE cable (UDMA/33), an audio cable, a set of mounting screws, a wire extractor, a CD with Nero software and two blank discs (CD-R and CD-RW ).

Mitsumi CR-48XETE

The design of this drive can be called not very expressive, which is generally typical for Mitsumi drives. On the front panel there is, in addition to the standard tray eject button, a headphone jack with a volume control and an operating mode indicator light. There are no inscriptions about brand affiliation or model name. The back side of the drive has a familiar appearance. There are power and IDE interfaces, digital and analog audio connectors, a block with pins and a jumper for setting the operating mode. In addition, there is a block of six more pins intended for factory testing. Unlike other models, it is located on the right, next to the power interface.
The Mitsumi drive allows reading and writing speeds up to 48X and rewriting speeds up to 12X. The buffer size is two megabytes. Unfortunately, there is no information about this particular model on the manufacturer’s website.
The OEM delivery option does not include anything with the drive.

NEC NR-9200A

The NEC drive with the NR-9200A index turned out to be quite difficult, or rather impossible, to find on the corporate WEB site. It is possible that this model is intended only for supplies to OEM partners, and not for retail sales. However, it is sold in our country, and we will try to tell you everything we managed to find out about it.
The drive design is very ascetic. It is clear that no attempts were made to somehow diversify it. The only thing that may interest a number of users in this aspect is the black color of the front panel. This kind of performance doesn't happen very often. At the same time, you can find a fairly large number of cases on the market in colors other than white. And here a small problem arises. Standard write drives with white front panels do not look very nice in dark cases. The way out of the situation could be models similar in color to the NEC NR-9200A. True, the drive we are considering may repel some potential buyers due to its minimal functionality. There is only a tray eject button on the front panel. The headphone output so beloved by many users is missing. There is one operating mode indicator light on the panel. The back side of the drive shows us a completely familiar picture. There are power and interface connectors, digital and analog audio connectors, as well as a block of pins designed to set the operating mode.
The drive is capable of reading and writing (CDR) discs at up to 40X speeds and rewriting CD-RWs at up to 12X speeds. The buffer size is 2 MB.
The drive is equipped with zero components, except for the plastic bag as an element. There is nothing unusual about this. The model has an OEM version and, accordingly, nothing comes with it.

Plextor PX-W4012TA

Plextor has long been deservedly considered one of the leading developers of optical drives. Three of its models were included in this review.
The design of the drive makes it immediately recognizable as a Plextor product. On the end of the tray there is the inscription PleXWriter 40/12/40TA in blue letters, which also allows you to evaluate its technical capabilities. In order to somehow enliven the appearance of the white front panel, it has a narrow horizontal groove. The latter contains a tray eject button, a headphone jack, a volume control and an LED indicator. The back side of the drive is made entirely according to the standard design. It has power, interface, digital and analog audio connectors, as well as a block with a jumper for setting the operating mode. On the latter, using an additional jumper, you can disable the default Ultra DMA mode and switch the drive to Multiword DMA.
The drive allows you to read and write (CD-R) discs at 40X speed and rewrite CD-RW blanks at 12X speed. The buffer size is 4 MB. In order to ensure high-quality operation of the drive, it uses proprietary Plextor technologies. BURN-Proof provides protection against buffer underrun errors during writes. When the data level in it decreases to 10%, the process stops and resumes when the data volume increases.
The PoweRec-II (Plextor Optimized Writing Error Reduction Control) innovation is a further development of the proprietary PoweRec technology. Its main difference from its predecessor is the use of a special “smart” algorithm that checks the quality of the media at every stage of the recording process. This ensures optimal recording speed and maximum quality are continuously maintained. The feedback mechanism implemented through the firmware allows you to monitor the results of the recording process so that they always meet quality standards. PoweRec-II technology is actually a symbiosis of several innovations. It is based on a combination of PoweRec, OPC, Z-CLV recording methods, as well as the use of the Buffer Underrun Proof system. In practice, the application of PoweRec technology looks like this. When recording begins, the drive uses OPC to determine the optimal power for the first Z-CLV section. At the end of the first section, the drive uses Buffer Underrun Proof technology to stop recording. PoweRec-II then checks the data recorded at the end of the zone for recording quality. If the recording quality is sufficient to increase the speed, then it increases before the next zone begins recording. Recording occurs in a similar manner in the future. With each step the speed increases until it reaches the optimal speed. After each step, the drive tests the media to ensure it can support faster write speeds.
VariRec (Variable Recordung) technology is designed to achieve maximum audio recording quality. It allows you to manually change the laser power. This makes it possible to optimally adjust the sound recording level to the audio player on which the disc will then be listened to. VariRec is used when working in Track-at-Once (TAO) and Disk-at-Once (DAO) modes. CD_DA discs on CD-R media are written at 4X speed in this case, although in many cases the nominal speed could be higher. Thus, the price to pay for using VariRec technology is longer audio recording times.
The complete set of the model immediately provides all the minimum necessary for the work of its buyer. In addition to the drive, the box contains an instruction manual, mounting screws, an audio cable, an interface cable (UDMA 33), an additional jumper, a wire extractor, and two CDs. One of them contains Nero and InCD programs, and the second contains a set of proprietary Plex Tools software. To get started right away, the drive comes with five CD-Rs and one CD-RW disc. As you can see from the above, everything is thought out to the smallest detail.

Plextor PX-W4824TA

This model is practically no different in appearance from the previous one. Absolutely identical design. The difference in the drives installed in the system unit can only be noticed by the inscription on the end of the tray - PleXWriter 48/24/48A. On the horizontal groove of the front part of the case there is a tray eject button, a headphone jack, an audio recording level control and an operating mode indicator. On the back side there is a standard set of connectors: power, interface, digital audio, analog audio and a unit for configuring the drive. In the latter, you can use an additional jumper to disable the UDMA mode and switch the drive to Multiworld DMA.
The model is one of the fastest in the Plextor product line. The drive can read and write (CDR) discs at up to 48X speeds (reading CD-RWs is possible at up to 40X speeds), and rewrite CDRWs at 24X speeds. The buffer size is 4 MB. The drive incorporates many of Plextor's proprietary developments aimed at ensuring maximum efficiency and stability. BURN-Proof prevents damage to blanks during the recording process.
The PoweRec-II (Plextor Optimized Writing Error Reduction Control) innovation ensures high quality recording. This is achieved due to the fact that the drive automatically identifies the media inserted into it and selects the best recording mode for it. A list of media previously tested by Plextor with optimal recording modes is stored in the firmware and is updated when it is updated. In practice it works like this. When a “blank” disk is inserted into the drive, information is read from ATIP. Next, the manufacturer, model and special properties of the media are identified. The received information is compared with the media directory stored in the firmware. The media parameters are determined. PoweRec selects the recording strategy - laser power and recording speed, in accordance with the preset optimal modes for a given disc. The drive then performs an OPC (Optimum Power Control) procedure to fine-tune the laser power. To do this, the drive writes 15 blocks in a special reserved area of the disk, using a fixed range of power levels (15 values). Then the recorded data is analyzed and the reflectivity of the “burned-in” recording elements (pits) in each of the blocks is checked. Too much reflectivity means the power is too low, and too little reflectivity means the power is too high. Thus, the drive tries to take into account individual differences between disks defined as “compatible media”. PoweRec then continuously monitors the recording quality in real time, working in conjunction with the running OPC system, which is designed to take into account possible changes in the quality of the disk's working layer.
SpeedRead technology allows the user to independently enable data reading mode at the highest speed. The default read speed is 40X, but for pressed discs and CD-Rs you can use the 48X mode. To manually enable SpeedRead mode, you must hold down the tray eject button for more than three seconds. The indicator light will blink green three times and the tray will slide out of the housing. SpeedRead mode can also be disabled manually. To do this, simply pull out the tray again or turn off the power to the drive. Another way to enable speed mode is through software. For this, proprietary utilities PlexTools are used. If the SpeedRead mode is enabled for disc categories not intended for this, then reading will still occur at a speed not exceeding 40X. These default speed limits are designed to avoid damage to the drive if substandard media is used. An interesting feature of this model is the ability to conduct self-diagnosis (Self-Test Diagnostics). True, for this procedure you will have to remove the drive from the system unit or, at least, provide yourself with access to its rear side with the connectors. Then you need to disconnect the cables and close the pins in the Cable Select and Slave positions with two jumpers at the same time. Then you need to reconnect the power cable and while pressing the Eject key, turn on the computer's power. The LCD indicator will flash green and the tray will slide out of the housing. After this, you need to put a “clean” CD-R disc from the list recommended by Plextor into it. Then the self-diagnosis procedure begins. If it went well, then the disc comes out on the tray. In case of problems, the disk does not eject; the indicator light blinks green once - a writing or reading error, or twice - an initialization error. The last technical nuance of this model is that the black color of the inside of the tray was not chosen by chance, but in order to reduce jitter and improve recording quality. A drive of this level, as you would expect, supports Mount Rainier technology.
The drive includes an instruction manual, a quick installation guide, an IDE cable (UDMA 33), a set of mounting screws, a disc ejector, a blank CD-R disc, and a CD with a software package. The list of the latter is quite extensive and allows you to fully satisfy the needs of the user who purchased the drive. The software package includes Roxio Easy CD Creator, Roxio DirectCD, SimpliCD by Oak Tecnologies, Plextor Liquid Player, Stomp Click’N Design 3d.

Plextor PX-W4824TU

The only external model in our review was the drive from Plextor. Not many drives with a USB 2.0 interface are available for sale on the Russian market. Therefore, the drive aroused particular interest - whether it could really compete in performance with models that have the same declared speed, but use the familiar ATAPI interface. The design of the model is very stylish. The metal body is silver in color and has a matte finish. The front and rear panels of the case are made of gray plastic and have rounded edges. On the top of the case there is the name of the manufacturer and the model brand with all its characteristics. The front panel of the drive is black. It has a tray eject button, a headphone jack and a volume control for the audio signal in it. There is one operating mode indicator light. The end of the tray is labeled PlexWriter 48/24/48U. The standard appearance of the front panel is slightly enlivened by the horizontal groove in which the above-mentioned organs are located. Due to the fact that the model has an external design, the appearance of its rear side is significantly different from standard drives. There are power and self-diagnosis buttons. In addition, on the rear panel there are connectors for connecting 12 V power, USB and two composite audio (left and right). To make it easier to work with the drive, there are marks on the upper part of the case on this side with information about the organs that are located underneath them. Inspecting the drive and working with it allows us to note the thoughtfulness of its design. Quite a large weight (more than 2 kg) and four small rubber-like pads on the underside of the body increase the stability of the platform and help minimize vibration during operation, and, consequently, achieve higher quality and efficiency in the operation of this model. Another aspect of the drive design is the low noise level and soft running of the tray.
The operating parameters of the model are almost completely identical to the previous one. A suspicion creeps in that this drive is completely identical to the PX-W4824TA in its “stuffing” and they are siblings, and the difference lies only in the interface and external image. In any case, both models identify themselves the same way in the Nero Info Tool. The drive can read and write (CD-R) discs at up to 48X speeds and rewrite CD-RWs at up to 24X speeds. The buffer size is 4 MB. The model implements all the best Plextor technologies. BURN-Proof will provide protection against buffer underruns. The PoweRec innovation will allow you to achieve maximum recording quality. VariRec technology is designed to improve the quality of audio recordings. Just like the previous model, you can increase the reading speed from the default 40X to 48X using the SpeedRead function. A self-diagnosis mode is also possible. The black color of the tray is made specifically to reduce jitter and improve the quality of recorded discs. The drive supports Mount Rainier technology.
The high characteristics of the drive declared by the manufacturer can only be realized when using the USB 2.0 (Hi-Speed USB) interface directly. This note is made so that you purchase this drive specifically for it. It can also work with USB 1.1, but the speed in this case will be several times lower and the money spent on this generally expensive model will be spent ineffectively.
The drive comes with a power adapter, an instruction manual, a USB cable, a special wire extractor for removing discs from the drive, and two CDs. One with Nero Burning ROM and InCD programs, and the second with proprietary Plex Tools software. When purchasing this model, its owners can immediately start working. To do this, the box with the drive contains five blank CDs and one CD-RW disk. Finally, it can be noted that the high price of this drive – $230 – makes it not very affordable, even for the majority of owners of computers that have a USB 2.0 interface and are freed from the need to purchase special controllers.

SONY CRX175E

The model has a rather nice “soft” design. A similar impression is created due to the rounded corners of the tray and the Eject button on the front panel, made in the same style. Audiophiles will love the presence of a headphone output and volume control. There is one operating mode indicator. The rear side of the drive is made according to the generally accepted design. There are power and interface connectors, as well as digital and analog audio interfaces. The picture is completed by a block of pins with a jumper to set the operating mode. Unfortunately, it was not possible to find information on this particular model on the manufacturer’s website.
The Sony drive is not the latest generation model. Its speed characteristics are quite modest today. The read speed can reach up to 40X, while the write speed is limited to 24X. Dubbing is possible at 10X speed. The buffer size is 2 MB.
OEM delivery does not include any components with a drive.

TEAC CD-W548E

The fastest model in the TEAC family of writing drives has a completely traditional corporate design. The front panel is not particularly fancy. In addition to the tray eject button, headphone jack and volume control, which is quite usual, we can only note the presence of two operating mode indicators. There are no hints about the manufacturer on the front panel. There are four transverse grooves stamped on the top of the drive, which is apparently intended to increase the rigidity of the case and reduce vibrations. The back of the drive is made almost according to the traditional design. We have to make a reservation due to the fact that in addition to the interface and power connectors, the block of pins for setting operating modes, as well as digital and analog audio connectors, there is another set of pins (6 pieces) on the left edge, intended for factory testing.
The drive can read and write discs at up to 48X speeds, and rewrite CD-RWs at up to 16X speeds. The buffer size is 2 MB. The drives implement proprietary TEAC technologies.
Fine Focus Control minimizes deviations in laser focusing in various modes. The laser beam is positioned strictly at a given position at all recording speeds, significantly increasing the quality of this process.
Another innovation that allows for high recording stability is Intelligent Speed Control. This system allows you to test the condition of the media before starting the recording process and use a number of its parameters to determine the highest possible recording speed with the best quality. For this purpose, an assessment of the number of tracks, disk balance, laser power, disk type, and possible vibrations at high speed can be used.
Like all modern models, the drive is protected against errors associated with buffer underruns during recording - it implements Bufer-under-run Prevention technology.
Compliance with Mount Rainier specifications can make life significantly easier for future owners of this model.
The drive we were considering was an OEM version, which in this case means the absence of any accessories in its configuration.

Yamaha CRW-F1

Yamaha is one of the leading developers of optical drives with original technical solutions. The CRW-F1 model is no exception. The design of the drive as a whole is closer to standard, but it is noticeable that Yamaha has made certain attempts to personalize its product. At the bottom of the bezel there is a horizontal groove with two thin slits in it. The tray eject button is made in the form of a thin flat rectangle. The only indicator light shows blue and lilac. It seems like a trifle, but still a nice detail that gives some individuality to the acquired drive. Those who like to listen to audio CDs will not be disappointed either. The front panel has a headphone jack and a volume control. The brand identity of the drive is easy to understand by the Yamaha inscription on the tray. The back of the case has a standard appearance. All connectors are made according to the standard design.
The model has read and write speeds of 44X and rewrite speeds of 24X. The buffer volume of this drive is large and equal to 8 megabytes. This solution is one of the three key components of the proprietary SafeBurn innovation, designed to combine maximum recording speed and high process reliability. The buffer size allows it to store a large amount of data, which reduces the likelihood of buffer underruns. Buffer Under Run Protection prevents the possibility of an error caused by a buffer underrun. The gap when recording is stopped is about 1 µm. The last, third element of SafeBurn technology is Optimum Wright Speed Control. With its help, the recording speed is automatically adjusted for a specific media type.

One of the exclusive technologies first implemented in the CRW-F1 drive was DiscT@2, which can be translated into Russian roughly as a disk tattoo. Its meaning is about the same as tattoos among people. In normal mode, write drives leave burnt areas of information 0.001 mm in size on the surface of the discs, which cannot be seen by the human eye. DiscT@2 technology allows you to increase this size to 0.1 mm and, after finishing recording on the disc, apply graphics and text to its unused outer areas. Whether it is necessary or not is up to you to decide. Not all people want to wear a tattoo. Moreover, there are some restrictions on the type of media suitable for this purpose. In addition, creating such images on disks “finalizes” them and makes them unsuitable for further recording of data on them.
Another interesting proprietary innovation implemented in this model is Advanced Audio Master Quality Recording. Thanks to its use, a number of goals are achieved. These include improving sound quality, extending the life of audio discs, extending the life cycle of backup discs, limiting skips and pops in mobile CD players, improving compatibility with older CD players, and protecting your valuable data. The effect of using Advanced Audio Master Quality Recording technology is achieved by reducing the jitter level by 30%, using wider information storage elements (pits and lands). In addition to the original 4X write speed, the CRW-F1 also supports 1X and 8X modes for this innovation.
The drive is capable of recording and rewriting using Full CAV technology. A constant angular rotation speed is maintained on the inner and outer parts of the disks. The electric motor spindle spins CD-R discs at an angular speed of 8700 rpm during the recording process. A 700 MB disc can be written in 163 seconds. To a certain extent, high-quality recording at high speed is achieved through the use of a special damping mechanism, which significantly reduces vibration and noise.
A major role in improving the technical characteristics of the drive is played by the new YDC-132-VLSI chip, which, according to the figurative expression of the developers, is the heart and brain of this model. This chip supports a number of key technologies:

laser power control
disk rotation control
CAV recording strategy
DiskT@2
Advanced Audio Master Quality Recording

The drive supports Mount Rainier technology.
In the OEM version, the drive is supplied without any accessories.

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Operating principle of an optical drive

CD drive device

Alternative to optical drives

Blu-ray is the modern standard for optical drives

AOpen CRW-5232

Burning time of test CDs

CD-ROM Drive Analyzer

Types of optical drives

CD-ROM

CD-RW

DVD-ROM

DVD-CD-RW Combo

DVD-RW

Form factor

A little about formats and speed

BURN-Proof

Overburn

UDF

Mount Rainier

ATIP (Absolute Time in Pre-Groove)

Testing methodology

Drives reviewed

ASUS CRW-4816A

ASUS CRW-5224A

Mitsumi CR-48XETE

NEC NR-9200A

Plextor PX-W4012TA

Plextor PX-W4824TA

Plextor PX-W4824TU

SONY CRX175E

TEAC CD-W548E

Yamaha CRW-F1

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