Lite-On SOHW-812S DVD±R/RW


 





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Review: Lite-On SOHW-812S
DVD-Writer
Reviewer:
OC-Freak
Provided by:
Lite-On
IT

Firmware: US0G
(US0J)
Manufactured: January
2004


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Lite-On IT was
kind enough to send us their latest 8x dual format DVD-Writer; the Lite-On
SOHW-812S. We have pretty good knowledge with Lite-On drives, as we have
reviewed several of their drives earlier. Lite-On IT is one of the main players
in the optical market; Lite-On IT is actually just one part of the large Lite-On
Company. The Lite-On company produces a lot of different products: keyboards,
power supplies and optical drives are just a few of them. But let us concentrate
on the Lite-On IT as it's them we are dealing with.


Also thanks to
Memorex for providing some of the media used in this review.


Some Lite-On
history:

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In 1995
Lite-On gathered some elite scientist and engineers from ITRI (Industrial
Technology Research Institute) to start an optical storage research and
manufacturing business in Taiwan. Currently they have
over 130 engineers with Master & Ph. D. degrees in their Research &
Development team, that are dedicated to the development of their patented
anti-vibration mechanical design, advanced circuit design, firmware programming
& performance tuning. The Research & Development team achievement is a
key factor that has ensured their success in product development.


In 1997,
Lite-On established a large manufacturing facility in China enabling them to
provide optimum OEM/ODM support to all 1st-Tier PC makers, which further
demonstrated their success in the worldwide Optical drive market. Today, they
are among top-3 optical drive manufacturer worldwide, mostly due to attractive
pricing and quality filled products, along with large OEM contracts. They have
also received top brand name recognition in many regions. These achievements,
plus superb management visions and planning, enabled them to continue their
growth and profit even at times when the optical drive market experienced
"price-wars" and many optical drive manufacturers were
forced out.


In 1999, they
created LITE-ON Information Technology Corporation, another proud member of the
Lite-On Group, to concentrate on developing and manufacturing optical drives to
stay strong in the storage business. They are going to carry on the tradition of
developing optical drives to expand their research and manufacturing capacity to
new generations of products such as DVD drives, High speed CD-RW drives and
COMBO drives to stay strong in both the retail and OEM/ODM market.


At
9th July 2001 Lite-On IT signed a co-operation contract with JVC, a
famous Japanese electrical company, to be in alliance with each other. Two new
companies was established, one is the optical drives manufacturing sales
company, named as JVC LITE-ON IT Manufacturing & Sales, Limited (JLMS) , the
other is pick-up head developing & manufacturing company.


JVC is a
pioneer in development of key components of optical drives and consumer
electronics as well, Lite-On IT is excellent in volume manufacturing and
developing, also skilled in IT industry. That kind of strategic alliance would
benefit both companies.


If you have
read our previous Lite-On reviews you may already feel familiar with this
company information, so let us now take a look at the specifications of this
drive:


Drive specifications:




These are the
specifications of this drive, found at the Lite-On's webpage:















































































































































SOHW -
812S


 


8x 4x / 8x 4x +
40x 24x 40x Half-Height DVD-Dual


 

 


  • ATAPI / E-IDE Half-Height
    internal DVD+R / DVD+RW / DVD-R / DVD-RW / DVD-ROM / CD-R / CD-RW /
    CD-ROM combination drive

  • SMART-BURN avoiding Buffer
    Underrun Error, Automatically adjusting writing strategy & running
    OPC to provide the best burning quality

  • SMART-X function adjusts
    CD-DA / VCD / DVD data extraction to a fastest allowable speed according
    to both data request rate from host and disk quality

  • VAS® system reduce
    vibration and noise during recording and reading

  • Support Fixed Packet,
    Variable Packet, TAO, SAO, DAO, Raw Mode Burning & Over-Burn

  • DVD read compliant : DVD
    single / dual layer ( PTP / OTP ), DVD-R ( 3.9 GB / 4.7 GB ), DVD-R
    multi-borders, DVD+R, DVD+R multi-sessions, DVD-RW, and DVD+RW

  • CD read compliant : CD-DA,
    CD-ROM, CD-ROM / XA, Photo-CD, Multi-session, Karaoke-CD, Video-CD, CD-I
    FMV, CD Extra, CD Plus, CD-R, and CD-RW

  • Supprot both 8 cm and 12
    cm disc of CD and DVD family

  • Conform to Orange Book : Part 2 CD-R Volume 1, Part 2 CD-R Volume 2 Multi
    Speed, Part 3 CD-RW Volume 1 ( 1x, 2x, and 4x ), Part 3 CD-RW Volume 2 :
    High Speed, Part 3 CD-RW Volume 3 : Ultra Speed
 
 


DVD
Family :


Write


DVD+R


8x (
10800KB/sec ) maximum by Z-CLV

   

DVD-R


8x (
10800KB/sec ) maximum by Z-CLV

 

ReWrite


DVD+RW


4x (
5400KB/sec ) by CLV

   

DVD-RW


4x (
5400KB/sec ) by CLV

 

Read


12x (
16200KB/sec ) maximum by CAV

 

Access
time


160
ms

 
 

CD
Family :


Write


CD-R


0x (
6000KB/sec ) maximum by P-CAV

 

ReWrite


CD-RW


24x (
3600KB/sec ) maximum by Z-CLV in UltraSpeed disc

 

Read


40x (
6000KB/sec ) maximum by CAV

 

Access
time


160
ms

 
 

Buffer
Size :


2
MB

 
 

PC
Required :


Pentium
III 450 MHz or faster CPU and 128 MB or higher RAM are
required

 

650 MB
HDD available capacity; and 5 GB free space for creating a DVD image
file

 
 

Compatibility
:


Windows
98 / NT 4.0 / ME / 2000 / XP

 
 

MTBF (
Life ) :


70,000
Hours

 
 

S/N
Ration :


> 75
dB

 
 

Environment
:


Operating


5C to
45C; Relative Humidity: 15% to 80%

 

Non-Operating


-40C to
60C; Relative Humidity: 15% to 95%

 
 

Dimension
:


145.0 (
W ) x 41.3 ( H ) x 170.0 ( D ) mm

 
 

Weight
:


< 0.9
Kg

 
 

Voltage
Requirements :


+5V
+/-5% and less than 100 mVp-p ripple voltage

 

+12V
+/-5% and less than 200 mVp-p ripple
voltage



 

Specification wise
it seems to be a real winner and should outperform the latest drives from
Pioneer and NEC '“ at least in some areas like CD-Writing.


The only drawbacks
we could see are the lack of DVD-RAM reading support and the lack of Mt. Rainier support.
A larger buffer would be nice as well.


Read on to see how
the drive really performs, we will compare it to the latest drives from Pioneer
and NEC among others.


Test machine:




For this
review we will be using a computer with the following configuration:


Hardware:


        
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-8KNXP with Intel
i875P chipset.
        
Processor:
Intel Pentium 4 2,8GHz 800MHz FSB with Hyper Threading support.
        
RAM: 1Gb
PC3500 DDR
        
GFX: ATI
Radeon 9800 pro
        
Sound: SB
Audigy 2
        
Hard
disks: 2 x Hitachi Deskstar 7k250 160Gb S-ATA in RAID 0 on the i875P S-ATA
RAID controller.


System
set-up:



The Lite-On
SOHW-812S was connected as Secondary Slave and identified itself as LITE-ON
DVDRW SOHW-812S. DMA (Direct Memory Access) and autorun was
enabled for all devices.


Software:


Windows XP
professional is installed on the computer along with Service Pack 1 for windows
XP. We will be using the following software in this review:


        
Ahead InCD v 4.1.5.10
        
Ahead Nero Burning ROM version
6.3.1.6
        
Ahead Nero CD/DVD Speed
v2.11.6
        
Ahead Nero InfoTool
v2.07b
        
Slysoft CloneCD v4.3.2.2
        
Exact Audio Copy v0.95 prebeta
5
        
K-Probe v1.1.29


Head on to
the next page and find out what's inside the
box…


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