Philips ED16DVDR external DVD-writer

Test machine:

For this review we will be using a computer with the following configuration:

Hardware:

• Motherboard: ECS Elitegroup N2U400-A with Nvidia nForce 2 Ultra-400 and nForce MCP chipset.
•  Processor: AMD Athlon XP 2800+ (Barton) 333 MHz FSB.
• RAM: 1 GB Infineon PC2700 DDR
•  GFX: ATI Radeon 9600 XT
•  Sound: SoundBlaster Audigy
• Hard disk: Samsung SP1614N 160 GB.

System set-up:

The drive was connected to the USB 2.0 interface, identified itself as Philips ED16DVDR. DMA (Direct Memory Access) and autorun was enabled for all devices.

Software:

Windows XP professional is installed on the computer along with Service Pack 2 for windows XP. We will be using the following software in this review:

⋅         Ahead Nero Burning ROM version 6.6.0.1

⋅         Ahead Nero CD/DVD Speed v3.55

⋅         Ahead Nero Info Tool v2.27

⋅         Slysoft CloneCD v5.0.4.2

⋅         DVD-Identifier 3.5

⋅         Exact Audio Copy v0.95 pre-beta 5

⋅         K-Probe v2.4.2

Now it’s time to take a closer look at the write technology used by the Philips ED16DVDR:

CD-Recordable:

The Philips ED16DVDR uses CAV (Constant Angular Velocity) to write at its rated speed of 48x. (The drive used in our review would not write any of our CD-R’s faster than 43x. We believe the reason for this is: the running Optimum Power Calibration (OPC), which automatically decrease burning speed when Laser power over margin due to ‘poor” media quality or high temperature). This gives an average speed of 32.47x. Two drives for comparison are found below.

The Samsung TS-H552B uses P-CAV (Partial-Constant Angular Velocity) to write at its rated speed of 40x. This gives an average speed of 34.27x.

The NEC ND-2500A uses Z-CLV, (Zone-Constant Linear Velocity), to write at its maximum speed of 32X. The drive wrote the last zone at 32X and this gives an average speed of 27.16x. 

For comparison we have made the following table:

As we can read from the table, the Philips could be among the fastest drives, if it actually had written the discs at 48x instead of 43x.

CD-Rewritable:

The Philips ED16DVDR uses Z-CLV, (Zone-Constant Linear Velocity), to write at its rated speed of 24x, this gives an average speed of 22.63x. Below are some other drives for comparison:

The Samsung TS-H552B uses P-CAV (Partial-Constant Angular Velocity) writing technology to write at 32X for CD-RW discs, the average speed is 30.21x.

The LaCie d2 DVD±RW Double Layer uses CLV (Constant Linear Velocity) writing technology to write at 16X for CD-RW discs, the average speed is 16x. For a better overview we present the following comparison table:

As we can see from the table, the Philips ED16DVDR is one of the slowest drives compared with the other one that also write CD-RW at 24x.

16X DVD+R / 8x DVD-R Writing speed:

The Philips ED16DVDR uses CAV, (Constant Angular Velocity) to write DVD+R at 16x. The Average speed is 11.98x and total writing time is 5 minutes and 52 seconds.

The Philips ED16DVDR uses Z-CLV, (Zone-Constant Linear Velocity) to write DVD-R at 8x. The average speed is 7.10x and total writing time is 9 minutes and 32 seconds.

The Samsung TS-H552B uses CAV, (Constant Angular Velocity) to write DVD+R at 16x. The Average speed is 12.03x and total writing time is 5 minutes and 58 seconds.

The Philips DVDR1640P uses CAV, (Constant Angular Velocity) to write at 16x. The Average speed is 11.56x and total writing time is 5 minutes and 48 seconds. The average speed is lower and the writing time is higher than it could have been due to the Walking OPC generation 2 using some time to constantly adjust the writing quality, we could se this as constant dips in the speed curve.

The BenQ DW1600A also uses CAV, (Constant Angular Velocity) to write at 16x. The Average speed is 11.32x and total writing time is 6 minutes and 7 seconds. Below we made a comparison table:

From the table above, we can see that the Philips ED16DVDR is the fastest drive writing DVD+R at 16x.

Features and techniques:

What is double layer recording technology?

Introduced by Philips and Mitsubishi Kagaku Media (MKM) in 2003, double layer recording technology offers two recordable layers on a single DVD disc, providing nearly double the capacity of 4.7GB single layer DVDs. The two individual layers are separated by a transparent buffer layer and are accessible from the same side of the disc, so recording can occur completely uninterrupted.

When a double layer disc is inserted into a compatible drive, the laser will focus on one of the layers and attempt to read an ADIP (Address in Pregroove) signal. From this signal, the drive is able to detect if the disc is a double layer DVD+R disc and which layer it’s focusing on. Once the media type and layer are determined, the laser can adjust its range of focus to read one of the two recordable layers.

Book type (bitsetting).

The Philips ED16DVDR supports bit-setting, and will as default write DVD+R, DVD+RW and DVD+R9 DL media with DVD-ROM book type.

Here is how you could check if your discs are really written with DVD-ROM book type:

Start Nero CD-DVD Speed and click the Disc info button and you should get something like this:

DVD+R with book type DVD-ROM

DVD+RW with book type DVD-ROM

DVD+R9 DL with book type DVD-ROM.

Another quick test is to start Nero CD-Speed and look at the disc information:

This should also say DVD-ROM.

Quality Scans:

Since the Philips ED16DVDR drive is based on the Lite-On DRW-3S163/SHOW-1633S is can be used to measure/scans burned discs for their quality. This can be handy to check and get an impression of which state/condition the burned discs are in. First we tried with KProbe and then with Nero CD-DVD Speed ‘“ Disc Quality Test:

The Philips ED16DVDR scan results of a DVD+R filled with 1.8 GB data.

The Philips ED16DVDR scan results of a DVD+R filled with 1.8 GB data. 

Included software:

Now it’s time to look at the included software and to comment if needed. Notice that we may not use the included software in our performance testing part of the review.

Nero OEM suite:

We guess that the Ahead program suite is not new to most of you; it contains programs for creating most types of CD/DVD discs, and Packet writing program, media player, etc.

Now that we have finished examining the drive and its writing strategies, it’s time to head on to next page, which is reading performance test…