[Federico]

Hi,
my CD writer life is coming to an end.
What CD writer do you suggest to replace it with?
I use it for burning "normal" audio CDs and for duplication plants too.
Plextor?
Which CD recorders do the mastering facilities use?
F.

[Laurence Payne[_2_]]

On Fri, 5 Sep 2008 12:27:13 +0200, "Federico"
wrote:

Hi,
my CD writer life is coming to an end.
What CD writer do you suggest to replace it with?
I use it for burning "normal" audio CDs and for duplication plants too.
Plextor?
Which CD recorders do the mastering facilities use?
F.

CD writers are pretty much a utility item now.

[William Sommerwerck]

I've never bought anything but Plextor. It's not just their reputation
(which might or might not be deserved), but their customer service.

They have terrific instruction manuals, some of the best I've ever seen,
which were obviously written by someone in the US.

And though you have to pay for the call, their tech-support people will
stick with you to resolve the problem.

[Mike Rivers]

William Sommerwerck wrote:

They have terrific instruction manuals, some of the best I've ever seen,
which were obviously written by someone in the US.

What have I missed by not reading the one-page manual that came with the
writable CD drives that I've bought? I know that Plextor has that
Plextools suite (if they still include it), and I suppose that deserves
a manual. But I've never had a problem with one that's required human
support (other than mine).



--
If you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring and reach
me he
double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo -- I'm really Mike Rivers
)

[Ty Ford]

On Fri, 5 Sep 2008 07:36:36 -0400, William Sommerwerck wrote
(in article ):

I've never bought anything but Plextor. It's not just their reputation
(which might or might not be deserved), but their customer service.

They have terrific instruction manuals, some of the best I've ever seen,
which were obviously written by someone in the US.

And though you have to pay for the call, their tech-support people will
stick with you to resolve the problem.



I just finished reviewing a Xerox CD/DVD duplicator that works pretty nicely.
D103; Internal HD, 1 read bay, three write bays.

Regards,

Ty Ford


--Audio Equipment Reviews Audio Production Services
Acting and Voiceover Demos http://www.tyford.com
Guitar player?:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4RZJ9MptZmU

[Laurence Payne[_2_]]

On Fri, 5 Sep 2008 04:36:36 -0700, "William Sommerwerck"
wrote:

I've never bought anything but Plextor. It's not just their reputation
(which might or might not be deserved), but their customer service.

They have terrific instruction manuals, some of the best I've ever seen,
which were obviously written by someone in the US.

And though you have to pay for the call, their tech-support people will
stick with you to resolve the problem.

Why would a CD writer need a manual?

[Richard Crowley]

"Laurence Payne" wrote ...
"William Sommerwerck" wrote:
I've never bought anything but Plextor. It's not just their reputation
(which might or might not be deserved), but their customer service.

They have terrific instruction manuals, some of the best I've ever seen,
which were obviously written by someone in the US.

And though you have to pay for the call, their tech-support people will
stick with you to resolve the problem.

Why would a CD writer need a manual?

"CD writer" is ambiguous here.
Most of us likely think it is an OEM component that you can
bolt into a 5.25-inch drive bay in a computer (or duplicator tower).
But "CD writer" could also presumably mean a standalone
audio recorder that writes to CDR. I would think that the
latter would need a manual.

[Scott Dorsey]

Laurence Payne wrote:
On Fri, 5 Sep 2008 04:36:36 -0700, "William Sommerwerck"
wrote:

I've never bought anything but Plextor. It's not just their reputation
(which might or might not be deserved), but their customer service.

They have terrific instruction manuals, some of the best I've ever seen,
which were obviously written by someone in the US.

And though you have to pay for the call, their tech-support people will
stick with you to resolve the problem.

Why would a CD writer need a manual?

Well, you know, they USED to come with a full technical manual on the
interface and commands. Not any more....
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[Roy W. Rising[_2_]]

(Scott Dorsey) wrote:
Laurence Payne wrote:
On Fri, 5 Sep 2008 04:36:36 -0700, "William Sommerwerck"
wrote:

I've never bought anything but Plextor. It's not just their reputation
(which might or might not be deserved), but their customer service.

They have terrific instruction manuals, some of the best I've ever
seen, which were obviously written by someone in the US.

And though you have to pay for the call, their tech-support people will
stick with you to resolve the problem.

Why would a CD writer need a manual?

Well, you know, they USED to come with a full technical manual on the
interface and commands. Not any more....
--scott

.... My first one was steam powered! ;-p

--
~
~ Roy
"If you notice the sound, it's wrong!"

[Richard Crowley]

"Scott Dorsey" wrote ...
Well, you know, they USED to come with a full technical manual on the
interface and commands. Not any more....

Lots of examples of technical gadgets that came with copious
stacks of documentation back when they were new technology.
But the decline in documentation could be attributed to...

1) The technology is well established now and specs are redundant.
2) Much (most?) of this is available on-demand on the internet.
3) Vendors are trying to save money any way they can to keep
their profits up so they can stay in business.
4) Maybe they're just trying to avoid killing more trees?

[William Sommerwerck]

My memory is that, when I installed my Plextor PX-708A, there was pertinent
information in the manual needed for correct installation.

Of course, as a technical writer, I tend to read manuals. And I was
impressed by the clarity and good organization of this one. Assuming the
product is of decent quality, that should be a good reason to buy it --
because it shows the company cares.

[videochas www.locoworks.com]

On Sep 5, 8:11�pm, Roy W. Rising
wrote:

... My first one was steam powered! ;-p

--
~
~ Roy

You were lucky. Mine was hand-cranked!

[hank alrich]

videochas www.locoworks.com wrote:

On Sep 5, 8:11?pm, Roy W. Rising
wrote:

... My first one was steam powered! ;-p

You were lucky. Mine was hand-cranked!

You had hands? We had to drive ours with a flagella!

--
ha
Iraq is Arabic for Vietnam

[hank alrich]

hank alrich wrote:

videochas www.locoworks.com wrote:

On Sep 5, 8:11?pm, Roy W. Rising
wrote:

... My first one was steam powered! ;-p

You were lucky. Mine was hand-cranked!

You had hands? We had to drive ours with a flagella!

Err... "flagellum". We had only one.
--
ha
Iraq is Arabic for Vietnam

[David Morgan \(MAMS\)]

"hank alrich" wrote in message...

hank alrich wrote:

videochas www.locoworks.com wrote:

On Sep 5, 8:11?pm, Roy W. Rising
wrote:

... My first one was steam powered! ;-p

You were lucky. Mine was hand-cranked!

You had hands? We had to drive ours with a flagella!

Err... "flagellum". We had only one.


Either way... still sounds like dirty sex to me.

[hank alrich]

David Morgan (MAMS) /Odm wrote:

"hank alrich" wrote in message...

hank alrich wrote:

videochas www.locoworks.com wrote:

On Sep 5, 8:11?pm, Roy W. Rising
wrote:

... My first one was steam powered! ;-p

You were lucky. Mine was hand-cranked!

You had hands? We had to drive ours with a flagella!

Err... "flagellum". We had only one.


Either way... still sounds like dirty sex to me.

Well, ****, it was either that or no CDR's!

--
ha
Iraq is Arabic for Vietnam

[Mike Rivers]

Scott Dorsey wrote:

Well, you know, they USED to come with a full technical manual on the
interface and commands. Not any more....

It also used to cost a thousand bucks or so for a barefoot drive, and
anything that costs that much had damn well better have a manual even if
I never need the manual. Not any more ....

--
If you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring and reach
me he
double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo -- I'm really Mike Rivers
)

[[email protected]]

On Sep 6, 6:57 am, Mike Rivers wrote:
Scott Dorsey wrote:
Well, you know, they USED to come with a full technical manual on the
interface and commands. Not any more....

It also used to cost a thousand bucks or so for a barefoot drive, and
anything that costs that much had damn well better have a manual even if
I never need the manual. Not any more ....

--
If you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring and reach
me he
double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo -- I'm really Mike Rivers
)

didn't you write the manual for the steam powered model???

[[email protected]]

On Sep 5, 7:36 am, "William Sommerwerck"
wrote:
I've never bought anything but Plextor. It's not just their reputation
(which might or might not be deserved), but their customer service.

They have terrific instruction manuals, some of the best I've ever seen,
which were obviously written by someone in the US.

And though you have to pay for the call, their tech-support people will
stick with you to resolve the problem.

Plextor is not OEM anymore and the software does not work with their
newest dvd burners.

[[email protected]]

On Sep 5, 7:36 am, "William Sommerwerck"
wrote:
I've never bought anything but Plextor. It's not just their reputation
(which might or might not be deserved), but their customer service.

They have terrific instruction manuals, some of the best I've ever seen,
which were obviously written by someone in the US.

And though you have to pay for the call, their tech-support people will
stick with you to resolve the problem.

Plextor is not OEM anymore and the software does not work with their
newest dvd burners.

[Scott Dorsey]

Mike Rivers wrote:
Scott Dorsey wrote:

Well, you know, they USED to come with a full technical manual on the
interface and commands. Not any more....

It also used to cost a thousand bucks or so for a barefoot drive, and
anything that costs that much had damn well better have a manual even if
I never need the manual. Not any more ....

Well, the good part of the commodity market is that the things that used
to cost a thousand bucks now only cost fifty.

The bad part of the commodity market is that if you want a thing that is
built like it costs a thousand bucks, you can't get it at any price.
--scott


--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[Peter A. Stoll[_2_]]

wrote in news:4e8c1950-60ce-49e4-918e-
:


Plextor is not OEM anymore and the software does not work with their
newest dvd burners.

Plextor has also shipped some bad stuff. I built a batch of 8 identical
configuration PCs for heavy data users at work about five years. The
optical drive was a Plextor DVD burner. At the time burners that would do
both +R and -R were uncommon, and this batch cost maybe $150 each. They
were lightly used, and more than half failed in the first two years (and,
no, the problem was not lint).

Separately and slightly later, I had two out of two Plextor burners of
other models faile in less than a year each.

I don't say my bad experience, which seems to have been centered on
shipments three to 5 years ago represents their current reality, but
neither does excellent experience others had 8 years ago.

With all due respect to the considerable audio expertise available here, if
you are selecting a half-height bay standard burner for installation in a
PC, you may get more relevant information on current models by snooping
around in a place where people hang out for that purpose. CDR freaks used
to be good for that, not sure what place is good now.

[Scott Dorsey]

Peter A. Stoll wrote:
Separately and slightly later, I had two out of two Plextor burners of
other models faile in less than a year each.

I don't say my bad experience, which seems to have been centered on
shipments three to 5 years ago represents their current reality, but
neither does excellent experience others had 8 years ago.

It used to be, the models that Plextor made were excellent, and they
also had error reporting built into the firmware. But Plextor also
rebadged some other units that weren't so good.

Other folks have told me that Plextor isn't making their own products
at all any more, so it's entirely possible that your bad experiences
are becoming more common.

With all due respect to the considerable audio expertise available here, if
you are selecting a half-height bay standard burner for installation in a
PC, you may get more relevant information on current models by snooping
around in a place where people hang out for that purpose. CDR freaks used
to be good for that, not sure what place is good now.

The problem is that some of the things we want for audio applications,
including error rate checking and the ability to burn at very slow speeds,
aren't really wanted by mainstream CD-R users.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

"Roy W. Rising" wrote in message
...
(Scott Dorsey) wrote:
Laurence Payne wrote:
On Fri, 5 Sep 2008 04:36:36 -0700, "William Sommerwerck"
wrote:

I've never bought anything but Plextor. It's not just their reputation
(which might or might not be deserved), but their customer service.

They have terrific instruction manuals, some of the best I've ever
seen, which were obviously written by someone in the US.

And though you have to pay for the call, their tech-support people will
stick with you to resolve the problem.

Why would a CD writer need a manual?

Well, you know, they USED to come with a full technical manual on the
interface and commands. Not any more....
--scott

... My first one was steam powered! ;-p

Seriously though, my first CD writer wrote CDs only, and at a maximum speed
of 8x; it cost me $235 back in 2000. My latest one records DVDRs at 20x and
CDRs at 48x; it cost me $23--delivered!

[Scott Dorsey]

wrote:
Seriously though, my first CD writer wrote CDs only, and at a maximum speed
of 8x; it cost me $235 back in 2000. My latest one records DVDRs at 20x and
CDRs at 48x; it cost me $23--delivered!

I still have one of the first generation Kodak drives here. It's slow, but
it's reliable, although it has no direct error reporting.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[Les Cargill]

Scott Dorsey wrote:
Peter A. Stoll wrote:
Separately and slightly later, I had two out of two Plextor burners of
other models faile in less than a year each.

I don't say my bad experience, which seems to have been centered on
shipments three to 5 years ago represents their current reality, but
neither does excellent experience others had 8 years ago.

It used to be, the models that Plextor made were excellent, and they
also had error reporting built into the firmware. But Plextor also
rebadged some other units that weren't so good.

Other folks have told me that Plextor isn't making their own products
at all any more, so it's entirely possible that your bad experiences
are becoming more common.

With all due respect to the considerable audio expertise available here, if
you are selecting a half-height bay standard burner for installation in a
PC, you may get more relevant information on current models by snooping
around in a place where people hang out for that purpose. CDR freaks used
to be good for that, not sure what place is good now.

The problem is that some of the things we want for audio applications,
including error rate checking and the ability to burn at very slow speeds,
aren't really wanted by mainstream CD-R users.
--scott



There's always Exact Audio Copy for error checking and I haven't seen
one that does not do 1X burning.

EAC doesn't, SFAIK, use any internal instrumentation from the drive itself.

--
Les Cargill

[Richard Crowley]

"Les Cargill" wrote ...
Scott Dorsey wrote:
The problem is that some of the things we want for audio applications,
including error rate checking and the ability to burn at very slow
speeds,
aren't really wanted by mainstream CD-R users.

There's always Exact Audio Copy for error checking and I haven't seen one
that does not do 1X burning.

EAC doesn't, SFAIK, use any internal instrumentation from the drive
itself.

But that means that it cannot report the first-level errors because those
are handled internally to the drive. The information is only available if
the drive has some extraordinary features implemented. The Plextor
products specifically were know to have this extra functionality. And
Plextor distributed software to take advantage of this feature.

The software isn't usually the limiting factor to 1x burning speed.
It is the drive and/or the discs that are generally the issue.

[Les Cargill]

Richard Crowley wrote:
"Les Cargill" wrote ...
Scott Dorsey wrote:
The problem is that some of the things we want for audio applications,
including error rate checking and the ability to burn at very slow
speeds,
aren't really wanted by mainstream CD-R users.
There's always Exact Audio Copy for error checking and I haven't seen one
that does not do 1X burning.

EAC doesn't, SFAIK, use any internal instrumentation from the drive
itself.

But that means that it cannot report the first-level errors because those
are handled internally to the drive.

That is 100% correct, SFAIK. I don't know exactly how it detects errors
- I've never worked at that level on that particular interface. On
Windows, a failed/retried read usually just bags the entire system -
it simply stops altogether.

The information is only available if
the drive has some extraordinary features implemented.

Unfortunately, I do not know anything more than that I have used EAC
to evaluate bad discs with both Plextor and non-Plextor drives. It
slows down the drive when it detects errors.

http://www.exactaudiocopy.de/en/inde...atures-of-eac/

I have used it to recover otherwise unreadable discs. I can
only infer that the device driver offers an error measure that
it uses.

The Plextor
products specifically were know to have this extra functionality. And
Plextor distributed software to take advantage of this feature.


Aye. FWIW, I am more concerned about the cultural implications
of this sort of thing being considered unnecessary than anything
else. This attitude has spread to even the IETF somewhat, which is
rather alarming.

People don't seem to have the idea that you have to have
instrumentation to diagnose problems anymore.

The software isn't usually the limiting factor to 1x burning speed.
It is the drive and/or the discs that are generally the issue.



Absolutely. My intention was to offer EAC as a possible partial
replacement for the removed instrumentation from the Plextor drives.
I doubt very seriously it'll do everything - it's not at the
right interface to do that.

--
Les Cargill

[Scott Dorsey]

Les Cargill wrote:
There's always Exact Audio Copy for error checking and I haven't seen
one that does not do 1X burning.

EAC will ONLY show you uncorrectable errors. As such it's not really very
useful.

EAC doesn't, SFAIK, use any internal instrumentation from the drive itself.

Right. The problem is that the drive corrects most errors, so the software
never sees them. The only time the software sees an error is if it is so
severe that interpolation is required.

You can have a drive that goes just fine through EAC but gets bounced back
by the pressing plant for having too many errors. And unless you can see
all the errors, you have no way to know what blanks and what speed give you
the lowest possible error rate.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[Richard Crowley]

"Les Cargill" wrote ...
That is 100% correct, SFAIK. I don't know exactly how it detects errors

It [EAC] reports the errors that are so bad they can't be corrected by the
internal firmware in the drive.

The whole point of the Plextor scheme was that 1st level error rates
could be monitored so you could make decisions about disc brand/
batch quality, burning speed, etc at error levels below the point where
the drive gives up and reports an external error.

Unfortunately, I do not know anything more than that I have used EAC
to evaluate bad discs with both Plextor and non-Plextor drives. It
slows down the drive when it detects errors.

http://www.exactaudiocopy.de/en/inde...atures-of-eac/

Note the disclaimer on that page...
"Detection of read errors and complete losses of sync and correction
in the secure mode, AS FAR AS POSSIBLE". (emphasis added)

Since RedBook audio discs have significnantly LESS error detection
and recovery than data discs do, errors that happen routinely on data
discs get automatically detected and fixed, while the same level of error
is undetectable and/or unrepairable in RedBook encoding. So at that
point EAC starts its extraordinary methods of attempting to rip clean data.

Aye. FWIW, I am more concerned about the cultural implications
of this sort of thing being considered unnecessary than anything
else. This attitude has spread to even the IETF somewhat, which is
rather alarming.

People don't seem to have the idea that you have to have
instrumentation to diagnose problems anymore.

Part of it is that things like optical drives have become commodity,
"jelly-bean", expendable items not worth debugging and/or repair.

[Scott Dorsey]

Richard Crowley wrote:

But that means that it cannot report the first-level errors because those
are handled internally to the drive. The information is only available if
the drive has some extraordinary features implemented. The Plextor
products specifically were know to have this extra functionality. And
Plextor distributed software to take advantage of this feature.

And all the other alternatives are very expensive. Meridian made a bunch
of models based on Philips CD transports for error testing, and they now
make an extremely expensive unit based on a custom transport. I think that
Nimbus does the same. And there have been a bunch of one-off units over
the years, mostly Philips players with counter electronics added. But none
of these came cheap.

The Plextors were inexpensive and convenient. I am sad to see them go.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[david correia]

In article ,
wrote:

"Roy W. Rising" wrote in message
...
(Scott Dorsey) wrote:
Laurence Payne wrote:
On Fri, 5 Sep 2008 04:36:36 -0700, "William Sommerwerck"
wrote:

I've never bought anything but Plextor. It's not just their reputation
(which might or might not be deserved), but their customer service.

They have terrific instruction manuals, some of the best I've ever
seen, which were obviously written by someone in the US.

And though you have to pay for the call, their tech-support people will
stick with you to resolve the problem.

Why would a CD writer need a manual?

Well, you know, they USED to come with a full technical manual on the
interface and commands. Not any more....
--scott

... My first one was steam powered! ;-p

Seriously though, my first CD writer wrote CDs only, and at a maximum speed
of 8x; it cost me $235 back in 2000. My latest one records DVDRs at 20x and
CDRs at 48x; it cost me $23--delivered!



My first (and only) stand alone CD recorder cost over 7 grand. It was a
Carver. The thing looked great! Clients were psyched! Blanks cost $80
each.

I ended up returning it after a couple months use cuz the sucker had
problems writing accurate start ID's, something any DAT machine could.
It was random plus or minus around 150 msec. For that kinda dough ...

Shortly after a 3rd party solution showed up, but I wasn't biting again.




David Correia
www.Celebrationsound.com

[Peter A. Stoll[_2_]]

(Scott Dorsey) wrote in
:

Peter A. Stoll wrote:
The problem is that some of the things we want for audio applications,
including error rate checking and the ability to burn at very slow
speeds, aren't really wanted by mainstream CD-R users.
--scott
Agreed, my personal recent experience (like last three years) has not
found very slow speed recording to be available on the commodity PC
drives I've bought (Plextor, Samsung, and Lite-On, a couple of models
each, most of them combo DVD/CD burners).

On a more positive note, among the Lite-On drives, reporting both C1 and
C2 errors in a manner reportable by the freeware Nero CDSpeed has been
pretty common lately.

I infer from comparisons of the C1 error distribution and rate whether it
seems like that a CD blank/burner/conditions combination is producing a
lot of sites near the edge of readability failure or not. While hard
errors are the only ones that "matter" for actual audio quality at the
moment, on decent media burned on decent drives they are too rare to
serve as much of a guide among the decent quality stuff. I worry that
burns with very large populations of systematic C1 errors start life with
less room to drift in storage than do burns with small numbers of
sporadic-looking errors.

I think there is a wide-spread assumption that slower recording rates
always give better burns. Examining C1 error rates for different media
at different rates on my (small) population of burners, I came to the
conclusion that for me my preferred pthalocyanine-dye blanks did not
benefit from speeds below maximum, and were for some combinations
somewhat harmed.

While all three blanks I used to prefer were pthalocyanine (Kodak, older
Mitsui, and Ricoh) Ricoh and Kodak disappeared on me, and the newer
Mitsui (last year's current MAO stuff) no longer behaves quite so well in
my drives and is expensive (living on their laurels, I think).

So I did another round of testing about a year ago, and settled on Taiyo
Yuden (I tried about 8 sorts, and it was a clear winner).

Taiyo Yuden is _not_ pthalocyanine. Perhaps that has something to do
with the observation that in my burner set it was modestly, but
definitely harmed by burn rates above 16x.

Of course, one flaw in this procedure is that C1 errors are themselves
the product of the interaction between a particular blank and a
particular reader. Most of them are probably not hard errors, just bits
that are near the edge of being read. So I think I can only compare
rates produced on the same reader, and worry that the "center of
goodness" on another reader is likely to be located a little differently.

I probably went on far too long on this, the one point I suggest for
those interested in looking for themselves is that Nero CDSpeed is a free
download capable of showing you C1 errors for drives that report them in
the way that it expects, and that at least some recent commodity drives
do so. (the example in this PC is a Lite-ON LH-20A1L, and I ran a disc
quality scan on CDSpeed 4.7.7.5 today, trying not to tell lies in
preparing this note)

I have and use EAC for attempting accurate rips from problem CDs, but I
am pretty sure it does not care at all about C1 errors, so it is useless
for the sort of margin maximization I want in choosing drives, media, and
burn conditions.

[Richard Kuschel]

On Sep 6, 4:57*am, Mike Rivers wrote:
Scott Dorsey wrote:
Well, you know, they USED to come with a full technical manual on the
interface and commands. *Not any more....

It also used to cost a thousand bucks or so for a barefoot drive, and
anything that costs that much had damn well better have a manual even if
I never need the manual. Not any more ....

--
If you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring and reach
me he
double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo -- I'm really Mike Rivers
)



A thousand bucks? That was inexpensive! The first one I used was
$40,000 including software to run on a 486 PC.(Sony) It write at 1x
and did not read CD's. The blanks were $35 each.

The first one I personally owned (still do) was a Yamaha 102. I
thought it was a great deal at $2500 because it had been $3500
previously.Blanks were about $10.00 each but soon dropped to $3.00. It
came with an excellent manual.

I've owned more thsan a few Plextors and have experienced both good
and bad results from them.the error rate may have been low, but the
reliability was only so-so.

My current duplicators are using Pioneer drives. I found the previous
duplicator with Plextors to be better mechanically. the pioneers don't
always open and close reliably.

[Geoff]

William Sommerwerck wrote:
I've never bought anything but Plextor. It's not just their reputation
(which might or might not be deserved), but their customer service.

They have terrific instruction manuals, some of the best I've ever
seen, which were obviously written by someone in the US.


Why - is the spelling and word usage wrong ? ;-)

geoff

[Geoff]

Scott Dorsey wrote:
Laurence Payne wrote:
On Fri, 5 Sep 2008 04:36:36 -0700, "William Sommerwerck"
wrote:

I've never bought anything but Plextor. It's not just their
reputation (which might or might not be deserved), but their
customer service.

They have terrific instruction manuals, some of the best I've ever
seen, which were obviously written by someone in the US.

And though you have to pay for the call, their tech-support people
will stick with you to resolve the problem.

Why would a CD writer need a manual?

Well, you know, they USED to come with a full technical manual on the
interface and commands. Not any more....

Yeah. Glad I don't have to pay for one of those. Just clutter up the
office anyway.

geoff

[Geoff]

Roy W. Rising wrote:
(Scott Dorsey) wrote:
Laurence Payne wrote:
On Fri, 5 Sep 2008 04:36:36 -0700, "William Sommerwerck"
wrote:

I've never bought anything but Plextor. It's not just their
reputation (which might or might not be deserved), but their
customer service.

They have terrific instruction manuals, some of the best I've ever
seen, which were obviously written by someone in the US.

And though you have to pay for the call, their tech-support people
will stick with you to resolve the problem.

Why would a CD writer need a manual?

Well, you know, they USED to come with a full technical manual on the
interface and commands. Not any more....
--scott

... My first one was steam powered! ;-p\

Mine to. It was the (in)famous HP4060i. Much steam emitted as a result of
that.

geoff

[Geoff]

William Sommerwerck wrote:
My memory is that, when I installed my Plextor PX-708A, there was
pertinent information in the manual needed for correct installation.

Of course, as a technical writer, I tend to read manuals. And I was
impressed by the clarity and good organization of this one. Assuming
the product is of decent quality, that should be a good reason to buy
it -- because it shows the company cares.

.... although much of the information carefully assembled and published could
be rendered obsolete by a simple (and possibly necessary) firmware update...

geoff

[Geoff]

Scott Dorsey wrote:

The problem is that some of the things we want for audio applications,
including error rate checking and the ability to burn at very slow
speeds, aren't really wanted by mainstream CD-R users.
--scott

Surely the burn rate (apart from 'realtime recorders) is irrelevant, and the
error rate is (nearly) everything ? There was a time when the two had a
very fixed relationship, but not since the last 5 years or so.

geoff

[Geoff]

Scott Dorsey wrote:
Richard Crowley wrote:

But that means that it cannot report the first-level errors because
those are handled internally to the drive. The information is only
available if the drive has some extraordinary features implemented.
The Plextor products specifically were know to have this extra
functionality. And Plextor distributed software to take advantage of
this feature.

And all the other alternatives are very expensive. Meridian made a
bunch of models based on Philips CD transports for error testing, and
they now make an extremely expensive unit based on a custom
transport. I think that Nimbus does the same. And there have been a
bunch of one-off units over the years, mostly Philips players with
counter electronics added. But none of these came cheap.

The Plextors were inexpensive and convenient. I am sad to see them
go. --scott

I should snavle up a bunch of them, make setup and operation difficult,
write a manual, and charge more for them. Call them Premium Plus or
something..

geoff