What burner should I buy?

I'm buying a new burner this week, and I need to know exactly which one to get. From consumer reviews, it would sure appear that the Plextor drives are the best. But just from one night of scourging some copying boards like this one, it sure seems like Lite-On is the way to go.

For best game copying (all PC, PSX, PS2, burning DC diskjuggler images), should I get a Lite-On?

If so, which one? I know the 48/12/48 is the newest one, but if I was more worried about copying stuff than pure speed, which one should I get? the 40/12 one can be upgraded to 48x speed, is that the best bet? Or the real 48x one?

And what firmware update should I install? On some other board, I saw some guy render himself unable to copy SD2 and 2.5 discs because he upgraded to some firmware that obviously changed something. I don't want to mess up my new drive by going too far with the firmware updates and removing stuff, but I also don't wnat to miss out on new features by not updating at all. You dig?

Thanks guys, this'll really help me out.

32x is enough, and yes, get the lite on.

I had purchased the Plextor 40x but I ended up getting the Liteon 40x and substituting it for the Plextor. It has made me very happy and while there are good points to the Plextor, I found the Liteon much better and more capable for copying games. I think the Liteon 40x is a great buy right now as it can be found on Priceline for just over $50. It can then be upgraded to a 48x if you choose. I am however using the Zs0K firmware and using the drive at 40x speed. I have gone back to 40x as Zs0K is the newest firmware and is compatible with all of my media and all of my programs, although I love the speed of Vs06, which I tried for a while. For now, Zs0K serves my purposes better but it is wonderful to have these firmware options.

I've heard the TDK's are just repackaging of the Lite Ons. I kinda like the way the TDK would look in my system (blue drive and all), but I'm obviously much more concerned with the actual performance. Is the TDK 40/12/48 the same as the Lite On 40x, or should I just get the Lite On?

And I'm still confused on which speed to get. The last person made it sound like the drive wasn't as good at copying games with 48x activated...

When I had 48x firmware in my Liteon (which started out as a 40x) it burned MOHAA in 2:25min. and it was perfect. But I used good media; Taiyo Yuden 40x rated. With the Vs06 48x firmware it also did fine with CMC (medicocre media). Not everyone has had good luck with poorer quality media and 48x drives. I did however switch back to the new Zs0K 40x firmware to utilize more programs. It also supposedly works great on a wider variety of media. I will switch back again to the 48x firmware when more programs are ready for it, like Feurio, which is one of my favorites.

So the point of this is that a 40x Liteon gives you a lot of flexibility. I guess you could try the TDK and flash it to a Liteon and have the best of all worlds; a drive that you like for it's looks and like for it's functionality. However, TDK has been known to switch manufacturers. So while it is a Liteon now, it could become something else soon. I'd buy the Liteon and I'd buy the 40x again if I didn't already have it.

Feurio doesn't work with the 48x firmware? I'd think that it just wouldn't work at 48x speed, but would still work the same if you set the program to run at 40x even if the drive is capable of 48x. What am I missing?

And if I get the TDK 40/12/48 drive, it is literally the exact same hardwar and I can update it to a Lite-On firmware? How can I be sure before I buy?

No, it (Feurio) just has not been updated to 48x Liteon drives. It just was updated to Liteon 40s' and 40w's. I am sure it will have the drivers for the Liteon 48x one of these days.

I am not sure how you can tell if the TDK you are getting is a Liteon. Right now they supposedly are. But I remember the TDK 12x's which were Plextor's for a while and then were something else, Sanyo's, I think.

Yah, not worth risking it just for a blue door. I might still consider this later, but since that is basically a Lite-On, I now have to choose between Lite-On and Plex.

From all major publications and stuff, it seems that the Plextor 40x is a champion in all areas. Now I believe it's better for data and audio cds just because it has 4 mb caches and a VERY quiet drive, but that doesn't seem all that hard to pull off. What CAN'T Plextor do that would make you get a lite-on over it? Cuz I've never heard anything bad about Plextor and I try to stay well read on my hardware.

I just sold my Plextor 40x burner which kept a warm spot in my closet for 2 months. Yes, it is well made and pretty with a black bezel tray but the Liteon 40x can make perfect copies of games with EMF encloding and the Plextor can't do that. I have had the Liteon for about 2 months too. I also have a Plextor USB2 24x burner but I almost never use it. It is a fancy decoration. However, it is true that the Plextor does protected audio that the Liteon can not do for now so that is a Plextor plus if you like to copy protected audio disks. That's why I keep the USB2 around but I have not seen a protected audio to copy yet that I would want. Either one can burn them however, only the reading seems to be a problem.

Finally, the Liteon 40x can be upgraded to a 48x immediately. I have done that but one of my favorite programs is Feurio and it only has drivers for the Liteon 40x so I am back to 40x from 48x but when it is updated I will go back to 48x (and maybe before). The Liteon is also dirt cheap right now for a great burner. I saw them on Priceline for a little over $50.

I see the CloneCD site ranks the EFM of the LiteOn's at 2 circles where it ranks the EFM of the Plex at only 1 circle.

My question is what about the Asus 40/12/40 which is ranked 2 circles by CloneCD, and what about the Asus 48/16/48 which is due out in a week or two? Price I suppose would be a factor.

I have both as well as the Litey 32 & 40. I have reported the ASUS 48x as also being a double-sheep burner The ASUS are a little more than the Liteys, but, the ASUS's are unsurpassed readers as well; so you can save on a dedicated reader if you like.

Hit the search button, top right, put my Nick "FutureProof" into the 'Search By User Name' field and "ASUS AND CRW" into the 'Search By Keyword' field and hit perform Search. For a more refined search, just use ASUS-CRW4012A and my Nick

Jeez, just when I decided on Lite-On you have to bring up Asus

Now I don't know which one to get..

Me too!

What about the LG GCE-8400B? This has a double-sheep. It is a fairly new drive and some of the other CD copying sites I checked has no info about it.

Look here

Just buy 'em all! (I need to get out at night, methinks). Checkout the LaserLock read speeds in the sticky pinned in the Experienced Forum.

The ASUS 48 is not much faster than the 40x. The 48x has slow disc recognition times. The 40x is a dream. The ASUS are quiet and don't require a plethora of FW upgrades (don't get me wrong, I love my Liteys). If you were thinking of buying a LTD-163 or SD-M1402 then with an ASUS, you don't need 'em; but, I guess that most ppl have a PC DVD player anyway.

ASUS/Liteon plus 163/1402 - can't go wrong

Well, I can only buy one. I need a CD-RW that can read and write everything. I only have one other slot and that is reserved for a DVD-RW.

And I have NO idea what you said in your last post since I don't know the model numbers or abbreviations

Anyone know about the Asus CRW2410A? Is it as good as the 40/48x speed counterparts? (For use with Clone CD,I mean).
I like the look of the LiteOn32x but I'm concerned at the chipset type means it's slowest speed is 8x CD-R's,& it cannot play audio CD's with copy protection.
I've current got a Creative 1210E & it can't play the latest musical CD's either. I'm reluctant to replace the Creative CDRW as I like to burn VCD's at a slow speed,(from home captured mpegs), & the CDRom drive is the only one I could replace short of getting an additional IDE card.

Liteon LTD-163 & Toshiba SD-M1402

One reader/writer = ASUS 40x

Slow disc recognition? What's that all about?

seek times

Thanks for the link. I did find a review on cdrlabs.com about the LG GCE-8400B.

They copied Max Payne and Serious Sam: 2nd Encounter with CloneCD 4.0.0.1, AWS disabled and was able to play the copy on the 2 DVD-ROMs and 1 CD-ROM they tried. Unfortunately it does not support UDMA33 but supports PIO4 & DMA MODE 2. Also, when reading a severely scratched test CD it had a high error rate compared to other drives although it handled lightly scratched CDs just fine.

Cdrlabs liked its 40x P-CAV write strategy, DAE performance, good data transfer rates on all media, and quiet operation.

Best Buy currently has this drive for $89 with a $30 rebate making this drive only $59 (US)!

As stated above, seek times, but mainly, when you feed a disc to the 48x it sits there wondering what it should do for about 30' - sometimes "Oh, this is a blank! No wonder I can't auto-run it!" doh! Sometimes it decides to read it and feed the info to explorer :grr

What can the Asus do that the lite on can't? If it's just read protected audio cds, I'm not interested.

Can the Lite-On do anything the Asus can't?

it's bloody fast on read and write, and can defeat CDS200. It can also write the new SecuROM * new * (NWN & WCIII) easily... the Liteys can't

look here and here