Plextor PX-708A DVD Burner

Burning Software
#1

Anyone have any experience with this drive? I bought it because my 24x Plextor could burn almost anything 6 months ago. Then the protection caught up with it.

Are there any drives out now, that can make perfect copies with just the burner software?

I am using clone cd, and just made a copy of Call of Duty with the safedisc profile, and it is a backup…but I am going to have to use a cracked exe if I want to play.

I downloaded Twin peak, and frankly I don’t have the energy right now to figure it out. I thought it was a simple utility. I didn’t know you needed blindwrite as well.

Anyhow, if this drive can’t do it, what drive can?

#2

I am having trouble as well.

I tried the “EFM Is your drive capable” test over at the Alcohol 120 forums and my PX-708A failed miserably. I thought this drive supported correct EFM encoding? All of the reviews I’ve read confirmed this. I have just updated to firmware 1.03 and can’t pass any of the tests. I haven’t tried the tests before the fimware update.

The only software I found that copied perfectly is CloneCD 4.3.1.7 trial using the “emulate weak sectors.” When burning with “ignore weak sectors” or “amplify weak sectors” I could not make a backup of Call of Duty. All the signs are starting to lead up to the fact that the PX-708A is NOT correct EFM capable?

#3

I have a plex premium which is simular to the 708A (other than it will make 1:1 backups of securerom 4.8x with bw) with sd protection…have to use emulation with that drive. i use my asus 5224A or my teac external for my sd titles working with latest version of clone cd works great. Also i may be wrong but isnt Twinpeaks used for securerom?

so the answer i guess is its hit or miss if your plex can backup sd 2.9 without emulation. i got a miss on my premium.

but if you use emulate weak sectors on your backup it will run fine. theres no need to use a crack (i wouldnt even mention it here it can get you banned).:cop:

#4

This really sucks. Had I known that the PX-708A was NOT a correct EFM burner, I would have saved $140 and gotten the LiteOn LDW-401S. It’s +R/RW only but who cares, I prefer +R/RW anyway. In fact, the ONLY reason I even upgraded to a DVD burner from my LiteOn CDR was because I thought I was consolidating two devices into one. I think I’ll do further research and then post messages to all of these different forums warning those contemplating buying the Plextor. I wonder if the 1.03 firmware update is to blame. All the reviews I saw were with 1.01 and 1.02 firmware. Anyway, very upsetting.

#5

Originally posted by AngryGuy
This really sucks. Had I known that the PX-708A was NOT a correct EFM burner, I would have saved $140 and gotten the LiteOn LDW-401S. It’s +R/RW only but who cares, I prefer +R/RW anyway. In fact, the ONLY reason I even upgraded to a DVD burner from my LiteOn CDR was because I thought I was consolidating two devices into one. I think I’ll do further research and then post messages to all of these different forums warning those contemplating buying the Plextor. I wonder if the 1.03 firmware update is to blame. All the reviews I saw were with 1.01 and 1.02 firmware. Anyway, very upsetting.

I wouldnt be angry thats a very very good DVD burner…youll be impressed with its DVD capabilities. And your right +DVDs are more compatable than - nowdays (older dvd players seem to like the - more) but you got both bases covered. I dont think the liteon is much better with EFM either so i dont think you missed out.

for your plex and CloneCD just use emulate weak sectors it works great with SD2.9+ just have the cdtray running on your target computer and your game should run fine!

hint: you need to hide cdr media anyways for running sd games on cdrws so the cdtray should be on anyways.

try the older firmware also you never know i have a asus 5224A and i had to go back to firmware 1.1 to get it to burn EFM correctly. If your looking for a good efm drive thats the one. prolly run you 45$ on pricewatch…i got mine from newegg.

but really if you just use emulate sectors i think youll be fine…try it anyways.

#6

Thanks! I feel a lot better now. I will try the older firmware and see what happens. Or actually, the 1.03 update does increase the burning speed of DVDs on certain media quite a bit so perhaps I will just keep it. My backups work fine just as well. Now I need to test some of my other games to see if they work before my trial expires to see if I want to plop down cash for the new CloneCD! Wonder how it fares with SecureROM and others.

Thanks again for your response!

#7

Originally posted by AngryGuy
[B]Thanks! I feel a lot better now. I will try the older firmware and see what happens. Or actually, the 1.03 update does increase the burning speed of DVDs on certain media quite a bit so perhaps I will just keep it. My backups work fine just as well. Now I need to test some of my other games to see if they work before my trial expires to see if I want to plop down cash for the new CloneCD! Wonder how it fares with SecureROM and others.

Thanks again for your response! [/B]

unfortunately it doesnt do securerom like the plex premium (maybe that will be fixed in a future firmware upgrade) with the premium and blindwrite you can get very good copies becuase the drive has a special burn mode. To use securerom just use the templates provided in the sticky above it should work. All drives have to use this method other than the premium.

also using emulate weak sectors doesnt hurt your backup at all other than restricting you to using the ccdtray which you already pretty much are using to hide cdr…so like i said its no biggie…

#8

Woops, thought the C word was a nono for requests and such. My bad.

Normally I would take the info you guys gave me, and search for answers on the things I didn’t understand, but time is really tight now.

also using emulate weak sectors doesnt hurt your backup at all other than restricting you to using the ccdtray which you already pretty much are using to hide cdr…so like i said its no biggie…

Is there a thread or a website you can point me through that would explain this process?

Currently I have a
Plextor PX-W2410A
The 708
And a Sony 12x SCSI (Drive is in a box in the garage, forgot the model number)

I want to be able to plop in a CD make a backup, then play it with the backup CD. The W2410A used to be able to do that for me. Are there any drives out right now that can do that?

Normally I’d dive head first and figure this stuff out, but my time is really limited atm.

#9

Originally posted by OG Gleep
[B]Woops, thought the C word was a nono for requests and such. My bad.

Normally I would take the info you guys gave me, and search for answers on the things I didn’t understand, but time is really tight now.

[/b]

Is there a thread or a website you can point me through that would explain this process?

Currently I have a
Plextor PX-W2410A
The 708
And a Sony 12x SCSI (Drive is in a box in the garage, forgot the model number)

I want to be able to plop in a CD make a backup, then play it with the backup CD. The W2410A used to be able to do that for me. Are there any drives out right now that can do that?

Normally I’d dive head first and figure this stuff out, but my time is really limited atm. [/B]

ccdtray comes with clonecd it sits at the bottom of your taskbar you dont have to do anything…just choose copy protected game and burn it to your harddrive then choose the same protection and write it to your cd…your copy will then play on that computer…if you have another you need clonecd on that one too.

#10

Hey Jamos,

I guess any ATIP “hider” will acccomplish this, correct? (like the Alcohol 120% tray etc). And we will always need this uility to hide the CDR from safedisk anyway if we play from a burner (say if our computer lacks a non-burning drive like my Shuttle XPC that has only one 5.25" drive bay). This makes me feel better as well. Think I will definitely purchase CloneCD as soon as my trial runs out! I suspect that it will return to the top now that support has returned!

#11

Originally posted by AngryGuy
[B]Hey Jamos,

I guess any ATIP “hider” will acccomplish this, correct? (like the Alcohol 120% tray etc). And we will always need this uility to hide the CDR from safedisk anyway if we play from a burner (say if our computer lacks a non-burning drive like my Shuttle XPC that has only one 5.25" drive bay). This makes me feel better as well. Think I will definitely purchase CloneCD as soon as my trial runs out! I suspect that it will return to the top now that support has returned! [/B]

you are correct it works just like alc120s except i think ccdtray works better than alc120s. i like it the best so far though backing up new securerom titles doesnt fully work yet with it yet thats why i still use blindwrite.

#12

Originally posted by Jamos
ccdtray comes with clonecd it sits at the bottom of your taskbar you dont have to do anything…just choose copy protected game and burn it to your harddrive then choose the same protection and write it to your cd…your copy will then play on that computer…if you have another you need clonecd on that one too.

Ahh so, I have to burn it every time I want to install it? I use my burner on my secondary computer, do I need to move it over?

I have a ton of stupid questions like this that I am sure have been covered a 1000 times on this board. I hate to waste space. Would any body be willing to answer some questions via e-mail?

#13

I have the external version of this drive and for me its main use is to just write DVD’s. I don’t think DVD writers are up to spec for copying games at the moment and we may all just have to wait until someone brings out a drive to do the business.

SG

#14

Originally posted by OG Gleep
[B]Ahh so, I have to burn it every time I want to install it? I use my burner on my secondary computer, do I need to move it over?

I have a ton of stupid questions like this that I am sure have been covered a 1000 times on this board. I hate to waste space. Would any body be willing to answer some questions via e-mail? [/B]

not quite following you…all i can say is you need clone cd installed on all of your computers that you play your title with. you only need to burn it once using clonecd and protected game profile to use emulation on one of your computers. the others should play it fine.

#15

CD Burners burn CDs - guaranteed.
DVD burners burn DVDs - guaranteed.

The ability for correct EFM encoding of regular bit patterns is a bonus but this is a CDRW feature not a DVD related feature.

Is this Plextor’s fault? Hardly.

#16

Hi

I have a 708A and all the backups that I made with this drive are working great on any other PC in my house, and on this pc’s there is no install of CloneCD, BlindWrite or Alcohol. Just plain clean systems and the backups are working fine (drive on all pc’s Toshi SD-M 401 or 2)