Hi,
I was wondering since the 2510 has a DL-optimized laser (which apparently is a complex thing to implement cause the laser has to write both DL and single media for which the laser has to operate at different frequencies or something), if this hasn’t hurt the single layer writing quality of this drive, both for writing single layer DVDs but also CDRs to make audio CDs?! Does that make any sense?! Anybody who knows more about this could please clarify this?!! Thanks very much!!
forget quality differences.
2500 and 2510 are exactly the same drive. I can say this for sure!!!
so just flash 2500 to a 2510 with one of the FWs and you got it.
The only thing you have to care about, is the warranty.
for ±20$ you get full warranty (if you buy a 2510)
both drives are very cheap (2500 and 2510), so it doesn’t matter…
According to many people they are not exactly the same, they did change something to the laser in the 2510, therefore my question if this could have affected single layer DVD and (audio) CDR writing quality as for the 2510 burner DL is the priority?! Strange there still isn’t a good review out there that tests the cdr writing quality, etc… of this drive.
what some people say doesn’t matter…
these drives are the same. my source is very very reliable. 
Well i have yet to see anyone produce a failure.
“they did change something to the laser in the 2510”
-> this is just marketing, NEC wants to sell 2510 too
and i think this is ok, because the 2510 / 2500 is one of the cheapest drives on the market and does perform very well compared to other (more expensive) drives
I had a 2500a that did not like any firmware other than stock, which it wrote to everything beautifully. Anything else produced horrible errors, but as it burnt ok at stock I couldnt return it.
which FW did you try?
did you flash with dos flasher?
I tried herrie’s DL beta 5, I tried the original 2510 fw, the ripspeed and rpc1 2.15 firmware, I tried the last single layer beta v6 or whatever it was. Even tried beta 6 which was a favoutite of mine for +R writing. My 2500a (beige) was fine on all, the problematic one (black) did not like any bar stock. Often discs would fail in DVD Speed, and when you looked at a disc after burning you could clearly distinguish where the drive had shifter through the speeds. Very odd…
and the disk-quality with original Fw ( 1.07 ) was fine?
that sounds very strange. maybe a bad drive…
Did you use an extra dvd-rom drive to verify the quality of the burned disks?
Q: Does 2510’s DL-optimized laser hurt it’s single layer CDR and DVD writing performance?
A: If the laser is optimized, meaning factory alignment for example, for dual layer burning it does not affect it’s single layer CDR and DVD writing performance. I have both a 2500A and a 2510A with Herrie’s beta 5 firmware for the 2500A installed, you might call it a 2510A@2500A, and they write about the same on single layer disc. I have not burned any CD’s on them as yet, but my guess would be that there is no difference. I also have not burned any DL disc as I am very frugal, O.K., in my case just plain cheap. When the price goes under $2 ea, yes $2 ea, that’s when I will use them, provided that they work properly. I may actually test one or two at $5 ea, just for “proof of concept.”
I understand that the 2500A and the 2510A drives are identical with the possible exception of factory laser alignment and quality control. NEC has made public relations statements about this matter, maybe hype, maybe not, but probably mostly hype. It’s the mostly part that concerns me. It may be that almost all of the NEC-2500A drives are capable of DL burning with a firmware upgrade. At this point, lacking any inside knowledge, I don’t feel that there is sufficient data to say what percentage of 2500A drives will perform as well as the 2510A when it comes to DL burning. There may or may not be quality control and alignment issues involved. The fact that no one has reported a failure yet, doesn’t mean that there won’t be or haven’t been any. I would think people are more likely to report a success than a failure, especially an expensive one. The more successes reported however, the better it looks for the 2500A, even better for the Mad Dog Dominator, I think that’s the name, that Office Max puts on sale for $35-$40 in the USA every once in a while. For the $15 dollar difference in price, it doesn’t seem worth it to take the chance that the 2500A won’t burn DL disc properly, especially since, at this writing, the price difference is less than the price of one DL disc. To sum up in one sentence: If you want DL capabilities and don’t already own a 2500A or an equivalent, buy the 2510A.
maybe i know people that have enough “inside” knowledge…
a secret agent!
[I]There’s a man who leads a life of danger.
To everyone he meets he stays a stranger
With every move he makes,
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Odds are he won’t live to see tomorrow.
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[/I]
And maybe you should quit spouting off about it until you can offer some kind of proof… 
Guys,
If you will carefully ready the forum, you will find detailed and real prove for that. 2500 and 2510 are the same in hardware!!! It was said so many times! Laser calibration that a lot of people talking about is going on the software level and it’s Firmware that do laser calibration before burning EACH disk or even each part of the disk on the specified speed. That was also proven many times on this forum! So the only difference left - as someone said - the warranty. If you care about it - pay extra $20. But as I said in another thread, usualy drive brokes in it’s ability to write or read disks, not the ablity to be identified by the computer. So in such case you can easy reflash original firmware before going to service. If you so smart to do that, even warranty “will no be avoided” from service point of view. So why spend extra $20 when you could have some fun for that money or just get some media to write to???
As most people reading this forum already know that NEC are not good at updating their firmwares; so people are resorting to hacked firmwares form Herrie and other people. If people upgrade their 2500A and 2510A using hacked firmwares then they will void the warranty anyway. I think most people will be using hacked firmwares on 2500A and 2510A so I can’t see the argument for buying 2510 at the moment.