Pioneer DVR-110D DVD Burner Review

Positive:

• Very good writing quality on most media
• Supports DVD±R/+R DL/-R DL writing at 16x/8x/8x
• Supports CD-RW writing at 32x
• Can write DVD±R/±R DL certified media at higher speed
• Can write selected DVD±R at higher than the media’s rated speed
• Supports bitsetting for DVD+R DL (sets auto. booktype to DVD-ROM)
• Can read Pressed DVD-Video/DVD-ROM SL/DL at 16x/12x
• ‘Two sheep” writer
• Good build quality
• Supports DAO-RAW writing
• Supports Mini DVD-R/RW discs
• Can read VCD at full speed
• The drive runs very quietly

Negative:

• Does not support Mt. Rainier
• Many DVD±R media burns at lower than its rated speed
• 40x media compatibility on CD-R could been improved
• Reads SL and DL DVD±R discs at only 12x/8x
• Can’t read CD/CD-R/CD-RW media above 40x/40x/32x
• No bitsetting support (Booktype – DVD-ROM) on DVD+R/RW media
• Can’t overburn CD-R media
• Can not rip ‘Key2Audio V3″  & Cactus 100 protected audio discs
• DAE performance needs to be improved
• Not a ‘lead free” product

Conclusion:

Let us summarize the most important positive and negative points below:

The main positive points: The Pioneer DVR-110D is the world’s first burner to support 8x write speed on DVD-R DL media. The DVR-110D can also write most DVD-R media with very good quality. This can be witnessed from our test results on DVD-R media.

The DVR-110D can write most DVD+R media with excellent quality; again this can be witnessed from the test results obtained during our write tests with DVD+R media. The DVR-110D can also write CD-R and CD-RW with very good quality, with some media (Taiyo Yuden and Verbatim) for example, the results are awesome.

The DVR-110D can burn a few selected DVD±R media at higher than the media’s rated speed, and still obtain good burn quality. The DVR-110D can also rip pressed DVD-Video at 16x SL and 12x DL, and pressed DVD-ROM’s at 16x. This makes the drive a useful DVD-Video ripping tool.

The Pioneer DVR-110D can burn Double Layer media quickly, and in most cases with good quality. This drive handled some DL media with good quality that many other drives struggle with.

Another thing worth a mention is the drive runs fairly quietly, and runs cool. This may be important in some environments, especially if the drive is housed in a cramped PC case or a hot climate. The DVR-110D feels solidly built, the tray has a nice solid feel to its action, and the whole drive has a feel of good build quality.

The main negative points: The DVR110D writes many DVD±R media at lower than its rated speed. This is particularly noticeable with 16x rated media where the drive can only manage 12x and 8x and in some cases only 4x. Hopefully this can be improved with future firmware updates. The same scenario can be applied to CD-R media, where many discs are burned at lower than their rated speed.

Bitsetting on DVD+R and DVD+RW media to set Booktype to DVD-ROM would be nice, as this would increase compatibility with set top DVD players, especially older models.

Read speed on DVD±R is locked at 12x. We would like to see this speed increased to 16x with future firmware updates. CD/CD-R read speed is also slightly slow at 40x, once again we would like to see the read speed increased to 48x for those types of media.

The DVR-110D did not perform well in our DAE tests. The extraction quality was excellent, but the drive failed the ‘copy on the fly” tests at speeds over 4x. Perhaps this can be sorted with a future firmware update. The DVR-110D also had problems reading some of our ‘protected audio discs” This perhaps is not such a great problem these days, as very few new audio CD’s are protected in my experience.

The DVR-110D failed our CD-R ‘overburn tests” meaning this drive would not be suitable for burning 90 minute or 99 minute CD-R media.

We would like to mention that this DVD burner is not a “lead-free” product,
and does not meet the recycling standards that will come into effect on the
1st of January 2006.

To sum it all up: The Pioneer DVR-110D drive is certainly a capable performer when it comes to burning DVD±R/RW and CD-R/RW media. Of course, many of us will buy a DVD burner to write recordable media. In this case the drive will not disappoint. If we were being critical, then media compatibility could be improved, with more 16x media being burned at its rated speed.

When it comes to reading performance, then this drive is a bit of an enigma. DVD ripping performance on pressed DVD-Video and DVD-ROM is excellent. Yet, when it comes to reading DVD±R and CD-R/RW media, the drive is a tad slow by today’s standards.

Overall, the DVR110D is a good drive, but needs improving in certain areas.

By using our CD Freaks price grabber feature we found the Pioneer DVR-110D drive is listed at $44.99 (September 2005).

You may comment on this review below or in this forum thread

Thanks to:

Bell Technology spol s.r.o. ‘“ Czech Republic for providing the media used in this review.

SVP Communication ‘“ The United Kingdom for providing the media used in this review.

Conrexx Technology B.V./RITEK Europe ‘“ The Netherlands for providing the media used in this review.

Medea International ‘“ United Kingdom for providing the media used in this review

Ricoh Europe ‘“ For providing the media used in this review.

E-Net Distribution ‘“ United Kingdom for providing the media used in this review.