I'm gonna post the results tonight.
Lemme give you guys a hint about my "not-so-final" to-buy decision, but i am 60% decided to get the TDK burner... 30% goes to sony, and 10% for pioneer... (I already own the Plextor, so what I'm deciding on is what to buy to replace it, i want a new dual-format drive, but Plextor's results will be posted as well).
TDK impressed me with its speedy burning, but not with its 2MB buffer, cause i saw the drive (same with the pioneer) stop burning when the buffer drops to about 10% in Nero (the lowest i saw was 6% by Pioneer drive)... the drives' LED goes out, showing me that it stopped burning, then it will light up again when the buffer gets refilled... That did not happen at all for the Sony DRU-510A. The buffer did not go below 97, and did not go higher than 98. In other words, it goes back and forth 97 and 98, and the burn never stopped. However, total burning time did not differ that much, the biggest difference probably around 45 to 50 sec.
TDK 440N, which is based on ND-1300A, wins the sleekest look. It's faceplate is black though (i love it) and it is the best looking drive i have ever laid my hands on. The eject button, though recessed, was very responsive and it did not miss to open the drive at any time, which should not be a problem to anybody. The logos of the -R/RW and the +RW looks neat and professional on the drive, same with the TDK logo on the left side of the tray. The tray opens and closes just like the Plextor, obviously because both are based on NEC drives. I don't find it flimsy at all. Black CD tray is also a feature of this drive, which according to plextor reduces jitter while burning. The package also proves to be the best among 4 drives i have tested, which includes a video tutorial for newbies on how to install your drive. emergency eject button is also included, complete user's manual, for both the drive and the software, it came with 1 DVD+R 4x, and 1 DVD-R 4X, although no rewritable media was included, and also no audio cable. With it's fast performance, I am close to buying this drive. The only thing that's holding me now is its buffer, when i saw that buffer going empty, while my computer is not doing anything but burning, i wonder what if i am doing other things like video editing, or probably play some games, while burning DVD's. I know with its buffer under run protection, that should not be a problem, but still a bigger buffer would always be better.
Sony DRU-510A, which is the latest drive from Sony, features on of the first in the industry, including 4X DVD+RW, 16X UltraSpeed CD-RW, 24X CD-R, 8MB Buffer. it also includes a bunch of softwares, mainly Veritas Record Now. This is the fastest according to some reviews, but not on my tests. The faceplate intrigued me a lot, and i have always wondered how it actually looks like. Well, upon installing it on my computer, it protrudes a lot on my case. The tray's eject mechanism is the noisiest of the bunch. The LED's color is a bright orange. eject button is responsive, too. excellent burning due to its 8mb buffer, it did not go below 97 as i've mentioned. unfortunately, after burning 4.4GB on a DVD+RW i've been using, and ran CD-Speed of the media to my Plextor PX-504A, the results were not so good, making me think the burn of the Sony is not that clean or something, when i ran CD-Speed of the same media on the Sony drive itself, it read it fine, again, making me think it can read its own burn perfectly, but other drives can't. All other's burns read fine on my Plextor. Using the same media again, i put it back on my plextor to write the same 4.4GB on it, so performed quick-erase, and when the burning is finished (after 22+ mins) nero is not able to close the media, invalid block address error is the message... tried this several times (around 3 to 4 times) and i got the same error message. tried the same process again on the Sony drive, and it wrote the data perfectly again. the only way for the plextor to be able to use that media again was when i performed a full erase on it. I don't know what burning Sony did to that media, but it kinda locked my drive for its exclusive use or something. This incident, and the fact that my plextor was not able to read back the media using cd-speed counted a lot why i do not choose to get the Sony right now. It's other advanced features counted a lot too that's why i gave it a 30% compared to pioneer's 10%. Sony's package also did not come with any blank media. The Software disc is on a DVD too.
now onto Pioneer, i cannot see any difference it could offer versus the TDK 440N. although it is a little faster than the TDK, and the fastest on my review (just on DVD+RW) it is almost the same in every way. Media included is a Verbatim 4X DVD-R and a Verbatin 2X DVD-RW. Probably the pioneer came with a nicer software bundle, which includes Ulead Softwares, and Nero, whereas the TDK came with Roxio Easy CD & DVD Creator 6. The drive itself doesn't have the Pioneer name on the tray, rather, it is exactly the same as the the OEM DVR-106D. The drive itself is labeled DVR-106D on its top, and on the brochure it came with. The instruction manual says DVR-A06U, and same with the Installation Disc. No IDE Cable included, only an audio cable and screws. no emergency eject tool either. only plextor and TDK came with that tool.
The sleek look and a little faster performance counted a lot for me to vote for the TDK. I am still to look at the results closely, and based on those and my personal experience with the drives, i would be able to decide which to get. but, as i've said, most likely, i'll be getting the TDK 440N.
i found a review on the TDK here
http://www.neoseeker.com/resourcelink.html?rid=58971
hope this helps. thanks for reading...
, and of course not on the plextor too cause it is a +R/+RW drive only.
