I got a Sony DRU-710A for Christmas. I've backed up quite a few dvd's successfully using cheap Teon disks from Staples. Also some Memorex disks. So far no problems even though this drive doesn't seem to be regarded very highly in these forums since it's a Lite_on clone. Movies play back fine on 3 different stand alone players. A Daewoo, Apex and Samsung.
My brother wanted to get a drive and bought the IDVD16DD I/O magic from Staples for only $40 after the rebate. Seemed like a good deal but we tried burning about 4 disks with it and every single one of them would freeze somewhere during playback on the stand alone machines. The Apex would pause and eventually continue on but the Daewood would freeze up completely. (We were backing up tv show collections). What was even worse, nothing burned on the I/O magic would play back at all on my Sony drive. The Sony would light up trying to read the disks and basically lock up the pc with "not responding" errors. It seemed the only thing that could read the disks back very well was the I/O drive itself. I even took my Sony out, put the I/O magic in my pc and ripped one of the disks that wouldn't play back to my hard drive. Then put my Sony back in, reburned the same files and now the disk plays fine on the stand alone players. He ended up returning the I/O Magic to Staples.
Anyway, this brought me to the forum looking for some help. He still wants to get a drive but the Sony is pretty expensive and recommendations in here are quite different. I was thinking of picking up the NEC 3520A for him but the above weirdness has me wondering. Another forum said the I/O magic was a clone of the Benq which also seems to rate really high on this forum. I don't want something that will end up with the same problem.
So, does anyone have some advice or even tips as to why that I/O magic didnt seem very compatible? Could the lack of compatiblity have been something as simple as it not liking the blank media I was using? The fact my Sony couldnt read disks created on the I/O magic at all has me a little concerned.