Lite-On doesn't like pressed DVD-ROM discs?

[lordyu]

A number of users here have had problem with LH-20A1P/LH-20A1H and pressed dual-layer DVD-Video disc. The drive doesn’t recognize the disc. The disc plays fine in standalone DVD players. For one user, the symptom when inserting the disc was that the LED went on for 20 seconds then blinked for 5 times before went off and Windows saw it as there was no disc in the drive. He had to RMA the drive just to find out that it’s still fail to recognize the disc most of the time. He has to load-and-eject the tray for several time before the disc can be recognized. The DVD-Video disc in question is JBF31012005 V.697 (DVD9 -RESIDENT EVILS 2) For Promotion Only came with a standalone Pioneer player and it’s his only pressed DVD disc. There is no problem with other types of discs either reading or burning. The S/N and origin of the drives (original one and the RMA’ed one) are: LH-20A1P 2337074xxxxx China Feb 07 and LH-20A1P 3227074xxxxx China Feb 07.

Another user also has the same problem but with LH-20A1H 3136504xxxxx China Dec 06.

Also I heard a member saying:

I say the same about LiteOn drives. I had 4 LiteOn drives so far and all 4 were crap out of the box. My biggest concern with LiteOn are the incompatibility issues with DVD-ROMs.

So is it the norm for Lite-On drives not to like pressed DVD-ROM? Is there any remedy for this problem?

Cheers!

[steve_b1]

I have only one pressed DVD and it is a dual layer.

My 1693 and 165h6 can read it fine, and CDspeed shows it to be a good disc.

But my 16a7 has a very difficult time reading the second layer. CDspeed Disc Quality shows the first layer to be good but the second layer has a huge amount of errors. The transfer rate test aborts at the layer break.

So in my experience, the six series is the last series that can handle a dual layer pressed disc. But I don’t have the new 1 series.

[lordyu]

Thanks for your input, steve b.

Another quote:

The LiteOn is only a good alternative if you don’t plan to use it as a Video DVD reader. It’s a fast ripper but it cannot handle all pressed DVDs on the market. It does fail with a lot of scratch free dual layer discs. The newer LG and Samsung drives are much more reliable readers even if they are slower.

I’m kinda disappointed. I wanted to have something to recommend to people here after the era of good all-rounders BenQ DW1640/DW1650/DW1655. LH-20A1P/LH-20A1H seemed like the way to go. But now…

[qwakrz]

I only have 1 problem with my 20A1P, it has compatability problems with AnyDVD which causes an encoded disc to not be decoded properly at some point in the rip.

Appart from the above (which does not stop disc reconition which is the problem you list) I have had no problems playing back media and using it to read and rip all sorts of pressed discs.

If I have to rip a DVD to back it up (rather than playing it) I use my DW1655.