Greetings all, brand-new user here. I have already searched this forum and didn't see anything I thought would be helpful, so I'll ask directly:
I just got an OEM NEC-3520A from NewEgg and installed it. Windows 98 recognizes the drive and it is functional. However, when I look in Nero to burn with the drive, my only choices for speed are 2.4x, 4x and Maximum. This is a 16x drive - shouldn't I have more options?
I was able to successfully burn discs at 4x (took about 30 minutes to burn a 75% full single-layer DVD+R on 4x media). However, I bought this drive to have faster speeds than this. It also took about 35 minutes to rip the same disc to my HD.
The specs of my system:
Dell Pentium 4 1.6 ghz
256 MB RAM
40 Gig HD (approx 9.9 gig free)
NEC 3520A DVD+-RW - set to MASTER
Sony DRU 2.4x DVD+RW - set to slave on a different channel than the other (I think)
DVD Shrink 3.2 for ripping DVDs
Nero Ultra 6.3 for burning
Like I said, the drive functions, it's just much slower than I would expect.
Do I need a driver update? How about a firmware update? Does the speed of the media have an effect on the speed selections that Nero offers?
I have tracked down BinFlash and modified firmware updates if those are needed.
Forgive me as I'm still learning this stuff, but any help would be most appreciated.
1: might want to get more ram
2: are drives set to dma mode in device manager\rom drives\properties
physically check that both burners are on seperate cables which means 1 of them is slave to hd
Well, regarding the burning speed. You said you're using 4x media. Thats as fast as you're going to get, 4x. A drive can only burn as fast as the media can handle, so to increase the burning speed, next time buy 8x media.
Another thing you might want to look into is updating your OS. I know my old WinME PC with 1 gig of memory rips DVDs a good deal slower than my newer WinXP.
Thanks for the advice guys, much appreciated. I did try 8x media and doing that gave me more speed options in Nero. I simply wasn't aware that Nero restricted based on the media it found rather than the speed of the drive itself.
As for the other suggestions, I will be trying those as well.
Will installing the updated firmware help me with the speed issue as far as ripping is concerned? 30-50 minutes to rip a single-layer, not copy protected, disc seems like an awful long time...
Well the drive is capable of ripping it onto your drive faster than that. Your comp specs are a bit low though which is probably why u cant rip it any faster. p4 1.6 is a bit outdated and the hard drives pretty full. So i would say you doin pretty good for the hardware that you have. All i can suggest is trying to free up some more space on the drive and defrag it but i dont think that would make a huge difference.
I just received my NEC 3520a from Newegg and I am not please with it.(I also have the Pioneer 108 to compare.) I used the hack firmware to unlock rip lock, and the max NEC ripping speed was 4-5x for pressed DVDs, while the pioneer was 12.5x. The burn quality of the NEC looks great, but I will return the NEC just because its ripping is inferior compare to Pioneer.
@legenux,
Just out of curiosity, was the discrepancy of the ripping speed between your NEC and Pioneer experienced with the same dvd? Because each dvd will rip at different speeds.
Yes, same DVD. To make sure, I re-tested another DVD I own for both drive ( rip -> burn ), and the NEC still rips 4-5x max, while Pioneer 108 reaches over 12x. I reflashed the NEC with other hacked firmware (Dee-27, TDB, etc.), and still the NEC ripping speed was slow. I do however like these quaities of the NEC over the pioneer :
-NEC made in Malaysia - better than made in China ( pioneer) IMO
-NEC drives opens and closes very smooth compare to the Pioneer
-The ring on the TY due to different speed burn was a bit less noticable on from the NEC's burn
-NEC burn the same movie / content a bit faster than the Pionner using TYG02 (12x)
However, IMO, the Pioneer drive seems more "quality" in term of build / operation
Turns out DMA was unchecked in the properties for the drive. Once I checked that and rebooted, I was getting rips in 18-20 minutes and burns at that speed as well. Still not overwhelming, but good enough given the limits of my hardware.
