Plextor PX-716A DVD Recorder

Now that we’ve taken a look at the Plextor’s performance with DVD+R and DVD+R DL media we’re going to take a look at the drive’s DVD-R performance.

DVD-R Disc 1a – Plextor 8x:

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Unique Disc Identifier : [DVD-R: TYG02]
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Disc & Book Type :       [DVD-R] – [DVD-R]
Manufacturer Name :      [Taiyo Yuden Co. Ltd.]
Manufacturer ID :        [TYG02]
Recording Speeds :       [1x , 2x , 4x]
                         [6x And Higher Might Not Always Be Detectable]
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The first disc we wrote was one of Plextor’s own DVD-R media (manufactured by Taiyo Yuden). The 8x disc was written at almost 16x but unfortunately PoweRec kicked in once again, lowering the write speed to 12x. Notice that the Plextor 8x DVD-R media was written using firmware 1.02. Here are the results when firmware 1.03 is installed:

DVD-R Disc 1b – That’s 8x:

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Unique Disc Identifier : [DVD-R: TYG02]
———————————————————-
Disc & Book Type :       [DVD-R] – [DVD-R]
Manufacturer Name :      [Taiyo Yuden Co. Ltd.]
Manufacturer ID :        [TYG02]
Recording Speeds :       [1x , 2x , 4x]
                         [6x And Higher Might Not Always Be Detectable]
———————————————————-

This time the That’s media (also manufactured by Taiyo Yuden) was written perfectly. Once again we see that PoweRec kicked in during the write process, lowering the write speed to 12x. But, considering the used media was certified for 8x recording this is a good result.

DVD-R Disc 1c – Verbatim 8x:

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Unique Disc Identifier : [DVD-R: TYG02]
———————————————————-
Disc & Book Type :       [DVD-R] – [DVD-R]
Manufacturer Name :      [Taiyo Yuden Co. Ltd.]
Manufacturer ID :        [TYG02]
Recording Speeds :       [1x , 2x , 4x]
                         [6x And Higher Might Not Always Be Detectable]
———————————————————-

As a final test with the 8x DVD-R Taiyo Yuden media we wrote another “TYG02″ disc, this time a disc sold under the Verbatim brand. Why write three of the same discs you wonder? Well take a look at the scans. The Nero CD-DVD Speed graphs show us that again PoweRec kicked in, reducing the write speed to 12x. Nothing special here and the PI/PO SUM8 scan looks fine. But, the PI/PO SUM1 scans reveals that when PoweRec kicked in the PI/PO values were increased which may cause problems when reading the burned disc in standalone DVD players.

DVD-R Disc 2 – Arita 4x:

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Unique Disc Identifier : [DVD-R: RITEKG04]
———————————————————-
Disc & Book Type :       [DVD-R] – [DVD-R]
Manufacturer Name :      [Ritek Corp.]
Manufacturer ID :        [RITEKG04]
Recording Speeds :       [1x , 2x , 4x]
                         [6x And Higher Might Not Always Be Detectable]
———————————————————-

The Ritek G04 discs were written well. The SUM8 scan is not the best we’ve seen but certainly also not the worst. The Plextor PX-716A was not able to write these 4x DVD-R discs at higher speeds.

DVD-R Disc 3 – eProformance 8x:

Media ID:		ProdiscS04
Write speed:	8x
Write time:	12m:27s

The eProformance disc was written with acceptable quality. Notice the long write time though of 12 minutes. This is caused by the drive’s AutoStrategy function. As mentioned earlier in this review, when the Plextor PX-716A detects a disc that is unsupported by its currently installed firmware, it will add the information of the disc to the AutoStrategy database. This causes longer burn times but note: when you write another disc with the same media ID the burn time will me much faster because the information is already present in the drive’s AutoStrategy database! So, when you write an “unsupported” disc the first burn will always take 2 to 3 minutes longer than usual.

DVD-R Disc 4 – Datawrite Printable 8x:

Media ID:		CMC.MAG.AE1
Write Speed:	8x
Write time:	8m:22s

The PI/PO SUM1 scan has some spikes that exceed the standard but this disc can probably be read just fine by most drives. Not a great result though, just acceptable.

DVD-R Disc 5 – Ritek 8x:

Media ID:		FUJIFILM03
Write Speed:	8x
Write time:	11m:07s

The scans from the Ritek 8x media are very similar to the previous ones from the DataWrite media. Once again we have a high spike in the SUM1 scan. Probably not high enough to cause serious problems any value higher than 4 is not wanted. Notice the long write time again because of the AutoStrategy function being used.

DVD-R Disc 6 – Verbatim (made in India) 8x:

Media ID:		MCC02RG20
Write speed:	8x
Write time:	8m:24s

The PI/PO SUM8 scans shows a perfect result once again but the SUM1 reveals high spikes exceeding the 4-error mark. Not a good result.

DVD-R Disc 7 – Traxdata 8x:

Media ID:		Ritek G05
Write Speed:	8x
Write time:	8m:39s

Media with ID code “Ritek G05″ do not work in the Plextor PX-716A drive (at least not yet with firmware 1.03). We’ve seen reports on this over in our Plextor Forum as well: the drive creates a coaster with these discs.

DVD-R Disc 8 – Samsung 8x:

Media ID:		OPTODISCR008
Write Speed:	8x
Write time:	8m:39s

The last DVD-R discs we tested shows the same result as we’ve seen several times before: the SUM8 scans look alright while the SUM1 scan shows some high spikes again. They are not high enough to cause major problems but certain sensitive players will have problems reading these discs.

DVD-RW Disc 1 – Mitsubishi 6x:

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Unique Disc Identifier : [DVD-RW: MKM 01RW6X01]
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Disc & Book Type :       [DVD-RW] – [DVD-RW]
Manufacturer Name :      [Mitsubishi Kagaku Media]
Manufacturer ID :        [MKM 01RW6X01]
Recording Speeds :       [1x , 2x]
                         [6x And Higher Might Not Always Be Detectable]
———————————————————-

The Mitsubishi discs we wrote here are one of the first DVD-RW discs to support 6x recording. Unfortunately, the fastest DVD-RW recording speed the Plextor PX-716A supports is 4x. The PI/PO scans don’t look great but the disc was readable after it was burned.

DVD-RW Disc 2 – Memorex 2x:

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Unique Disc Identifier : [DVD-RW: TDK502sakuM3]
———————————————————-
Disc & Book Type :       [DVD-RW] – [DVD-RW]
Manufacturer Name :      [TDK Corp.]
Manufacturer ID :        [TDK502sakuM3]
Recording Speeds :       [1x , 2x]
                         [6x And Higher Might Not Always Be Detectable]
———————————————————-

The last DVD disc we tested was written with a good result. There is one small spike in the SUM1 scan but this is not a problem. Let’s continue to the advanced tests.