Sony Slim-Line DRX-S50U Review

Positives:

• Excellent/very good CD-R/RW writing quality.
• Excellent/very good DVD+R writing quality.
• Supports 8x/6x DVD+RW/-RW writing speeds.
• Supports DVD-RAM read/write at 5x.
• Nicely designed drive; very small size
• Excellent build quality.
• Good software bundle.
• Low power consumption.
• Portable.

Negatives:

• Slow compared to a modern standard sized drives
• Writing quality on DVD-R DL media could be improved.
• Writing quality on DVD+RW could be improved.
• Lack of Bitsetting support.

Conclusion:

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

The main positive points:

Following our tests we found that this drive is a very good Multi DVD burner. The Sony DRX-S50U is called “Multi DVD Burner” since it supports recording on all available media formats including CD-R/RW, DVD±R/±RW, DVD±R Double/Dual Layer, and DVD-RAM.  It is packed with a comprehensive software suite from Nero Burning ROM 7 which is worth the extra retail price.

The Sony DRX-S50U was able to burn all our tested CD-R media with very good to excellent quality.  Our tests on DVD+R media were also very good to excellent for the most part. 

The small size and design of the Sony DRX-S50U coupled with the quality of the build will make it a welcome as a portable drive.

The main negative points: 

There are very few negative things to say about the Sony DRX-S50U, the drive is slow at reading and writing compared to a modern 18x/20x DVD Re-Writer, but then again it is in line with most of the slim line drives available at this time.

We would like to see the write quality on our tested DVD-R DL and DVD+RW media improved.

To sum up, this is what we would say:

“Sony DRX-S50U is overall a fine and good performance Multi DVD Burner.”