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What is a durable, reliable DVD burner?

thegreatduke

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Hello peeps. Please recommend a reliable, durable DVD burner to me. I've been going through a few burners in the last few months. I had a Memorex for over a year and it began dying on me last fall. So I've been trying different brands, and they've been wearing out on me, and then I've been returning them and trying new ones. In fact, I got one earlier this evening, a Sony, and its not even burning properly with reliable Slysoft products! Please help me, your recommendations will be taken into consideration when I return this brand new junk, get a new one that can last for me.
 
click http://forum.slysoft.com/showthread.php?t=767

Some may argue with me, but in my opinion, for build quality they all mostly suck across the board now.
I have not come across anything with the build quality of old Plextor cd-rw drives (the ones that use to cost $200-$300 and
weren't made in China). In fact, I still have an old PX-W1210A that refuses to die 7 years later.

What do you expect from a $30-$50 drive? Pioneer's aren't bad for build quality, but even the 112s were suffering from cd issues, depending
on the build.

No one wants to pay $200-$300 anymore for good quality that lasts, so mediocrity with respect to build quality is what people can expect. The same applies to blank media. Very few people want to pay a premium for good quality blank media. Verbatim +R DL use to be made in Singapore. To reduce costs, the blanks are now made in India. Quality has suffered, despite what Verbatim claims, but costs have decreased as a result.

A lot of people don't want to pay for Taiyo Yuden and Verbatim, much less Maxell Broadcast Quality, and then people wonder why their discs stop working within 6 months to a couple of years later.
 
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Lite-On makes very reliable DVDRW's. I have used several and include them with all of my retail builds without any problems. Cheap, reliable, durable.
 

We'll have to agree to disagree on this point. My friend who was a big Lite-on fan has had 10 (yes 10) DH-20A3Hs break down on him within 7 months of use. All had to be RMAed.

That said, I have an old Lite-on dvd-rom drive that I can't kill no matter what I do (JLMS XJ-HD166S). It's an excellent reader.

I am, in general, not impressed with build quality on most optical drives any more. The brand name doesn't matter; I feel most of them are bad.
 
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Yeah, it seems like nothing lasts long nowadays. Perhaps you're right, they got cheap labor. I'm going to a local Best Buy this morning to get a new one. I swear it seems like to lifespan of a new burner is 2 weeks or a tiny bit more, other than that they begin to mess up or have errors while burning. They just don't burn properly after awhile. So there are currently no reliable brands no matter the name. I honestly burn a lot because I own a lot of DVDs from past to present and like to have a back-up. I also help my relatives who own lots of DVDs themselves who need back-ups.
 
So I'll check this thread again in before I get a new one today. I hope this won't become commonplace where I'll have to keep returning and replacing burners every few weeks because of durability. :bang:
 
All I can relate to is my, and my customers, experiences with Lite-On. I have 5 presently and have installed about 30 in the last 2 years. 4 of mine have at least 150 burns each and no problems with any of them. I do not own or ever install any of the DH-20A3Hs, or any other Lightscribe models, and most likely never will.
 
:disagree:I have Been using lite-on for about 6 years and have not out of 10 units had one to fail me yet I have had software fail me and look like it was the drive. you might wan't to check your burner software.
 
I have Been using lite-on for about 6 years and have not out of 10 units had one to fail me yet I have had software fail me and look like it was the drive. you might wan't to check your burner software.

I don't need to check my burner software. I know when drives are faulty (so does my friend, as he works in the industry). Period
 
:disagree:I have Been using lite-on for about 6 years and have not out of 10 units had one to fail me yet I have had software fail me and look like it was the drive. you might wan't to check your burner software.

Good suggestion. Corrupted software files can cause symptoms that appear to be hardware related.
 
:disagree:I work in the industry also and have found several bad pieces of dvd burning software will cause your os to fail to recoginze your burner. I have been building machines for the past 20 years so I belive I know a bad
drive also.
 
I work in the industry also and have found several bad pieces of dvd burning software will cause your os to fail to recoginze your burner.

I am aware of software conflicts (and generally need to be in order to troubleshoot properly on these forums). However, when a drive ceases to power on--or when the laser ceases to function, the drive is dead. But you're more than welcome to check for software conflicts in these instances, while my friend who gets paid to engineer computer hardware, instead (and correctly), trashes or RMAs his.

The fact is build quality has decreased since the time Plextor once made its drives in Japan.
 
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Go Plextor

They don't make their dvd burners anymore since the PX-760. They rebadge everything now. My PX-716 and PX-760 still work perfectly fine, but early TLAs of the PX-716 were prone to die early (many of those were made in China). Just another example of build quality going downhill . . . I never quite understood how Plextor felt it was fair to charge $100+ for a burner and then attempt to lower costs by having it built in China.
 
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I finally have time to post some stuff again. I've been really backed up literally. What a false alarm on my part, it really wasn't the burners' fault although they'll still wear out. I just got a bad spindle of blank DVDs. I opened and used a different spindle of the same TDK brand, and they worked. It wasn't the burners. Just bad spindles.
 
I finally have time to post some stuff again. I've been really backed up literally. What a false alarm on my part, it really wasn't the burners' fault although they'll still wear out. I just got a bad spindle of blank DVDs. I opened and used a different spindle of the same TDK brand, and they worked. It wasn't the burners. Just bad spindles.

Use

CD-Rs = Maxell CD-R Pro (these are Taiyo Yudens with a protective coating), Verbatim Datalife Plus, Taiyo Yuden
DVD±Rs = Maxell Broadcast Quality Series 8x (not regular junk Maxells you find everywhere), Verbatim 8x & 16x, Taiyo Yuden (not Valueline)
DVD+R DLs = Verbatim made in Singapore (not India), MAM-A 8x

only
 
I have two Lg drive and both of them are at least 6 or more years old. Yet they refuse to die. Oh yeah when I bought them I had to pay around 80 to 100 range.
 
I finally have time to post some stuff again. I've been really backed up literally. What a false alarm on my part, it really wasn't the burners' fault although they'll still wear out. I just got a bad spindle of blank DVDs. I opened and used a different spindle of the same TDK brand, and they worked. It wasn't the burners. Just bad spindles.

:clap: great to see the problem solved
 
They don't make their dvd burners anymore since the PX-760. They rebadge everything now. My PX-716 and PX-760 still work perfectly fine, but early TLAs of the PX-716 were prone to die early (many of those were made in China). Just another example of build quality going downhill . . . I never quite understood how Plextor felt it was fair to charge $100+ for a burner and then attempt to lower costs by having it built in China.

I am still using my PX-760 and went out and bought another that is still in the box when I heard they were stopping their own production of them. Have a Sony that I use for DVD-ROM and CD-R work so I don't use the Plextor. Good drive IF you can find one.
 
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