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Original Link: https://www.anandtech.com/show/1185
Nu Tech DDW-081: More DVD+R madness
by Kristopher Kubicki on October 22, 2003 10:54 PM EST- Posted in
- Storage
Perhaps most of us are not that familiar with Nu Technology (aka Nu Tech New), but virtually everyone has heard of their parent company, Quanta Storage Inc. QSI is one of the larger and older optical OEM producers for several US based system builders. Unfortunately for QSI, selling to retail stores and OEM clients began to infringe on their system components, and thus, Nu Technology was born. Nu Technology went into business officially in May 2003 as the retail branch of QSI, and already they have an extensive product line.
This week, we were fortunate enough to take a look at Nu Tech's DDW-081, a DVD+R/W only drive with CDRW capabilities based on the Philips Nexperia chipset. Even though this is one of the first drives to debut with 8X DVD+R, is it enough to dethrone our current champion, the Plextor 708A? Remember, our 708A is a dual format, but limited in CDR capabilities and bundled features.
Construction
We were immediately impressed with the amount and quality of the software bundled with the drive. Nu Tech bundled almost the entire Sonic suite, including MyDVD, CinePlayer, SimpleBackup and RecordNow (with Sonic DLA). One 4X DVD+RW was also included.As mentioned in previous reviews, we tend to favor Ahead's Nero with DVD/CDR combo drives, simply because of Nero's established name in the CDR sector. RecordNow is capable of just about as many CDR features as Nero, although we still feel a little disappointed. However, for DVD burning, Sonic MyDVD is a fairly strong suite.
Documentation with the drive was a little light, with only a quick installation guide of 11 pages (virtually all of which were related to installing and using Sonic products). One thing that slightly bothered us was the lack of documentation that listed exact specifications for the drive. Later, it was revealed to us that the 3rd revision firmware (BX03) upgrades the drive calibration to 40X CDR speeds, so the absence of bundled specifications was most likely because the drive's capabilities were not fully programmed at the time of production.
Click to enlarge.
We have yet to see many DVDR drives with a lot of style, so the DDW-081's Spartan white finish and hard edges were no surprise to us. The industry standard play and eject buttons were oriented on the right, with headphone jacks and volume control on the left. The LED interface is also fairly straightforward — a blinking green LED denotes loading, solid LED for reading, and solid red for writing. We were a little dissatisfied that the intensity of this red/green LED is not very bright, and even in a dark environment, it can be a little hard to see.
Click to enlarge.
The DDW-081 did not come with any intake or exhaust holes. You may recall that most drives at least have some exhaust ventilation, and even in the case of Pioneer's 107/106 drives, there are intakes in the front of the unit as well. In our opinion, less places for dust to get in the drive is probably better.
Specifications
Below is a quick overview of specifications on the drive. The Nu Tech website has the specifications listed as well:Nu Tech DDW-081 | |
Interface | IDE |
CD Write Speed | 40X, 32X, 24X (CAV) 16X, 12X, 8X, 4X (CLV) |
CD Rewrite Speed | 10X, 8X, 4X (CLV) |
CD Read Speed | 40X Max (CAV) |
DVD+R Write Speed | 8X, 4X, 2X (CLV) |
DVD+RW Rewrite Speed | 4X, 2.4X (CLV) |
DVD Read Speed | 12X Max (CAV) |
Supported Modes | DAO / DAO-RAW 16 & 96 TAO SAO / SAO 16 & 96 Packet Write MultiSession |
Supported Formats | DVD+R (DAO, incremental, seq) DVD+RW (random) CD-R, CD-RW, CD-ROM, CD-DA, CD-ROM XA, Mixed Mode, CD Extra Photo CD, CD Text, Bootable CD, UDF |
Access Time | CD: 120ms DVD: 120ms |
Buffer | 2MB |
Specifications on the DDW-081 are better than average, considering it only does one format. The 40X CDR speeds were not standard out of the box, so we had to run a utility to upgrade our CD burn speeds from 32X. Fortunately, all new burners should have this already enabled. Furthermore, we felt the CDRW speed is slightly weak, at only 10X. Our DDW-081 supports 8X DVD+R, but as we will see, it cannot write 8X on 4X media like the Plextor 708A. More confusion was thrown into the fray when we noticed that Nu Tech's specifications on their website were not similar over the entire product description. We contacted them to update their webpage, and confirmed with them that the above specifications are in fact the “official” specs.
However, we do like the lower access times on the drive. Many of the drives that we have seen have access times in excess of 180ms, and as we will see in the benchmark, the DDW-081's access times are actually a little bit better, in the 100-110ms range.
Underrun technology is backed by Seamless Link, which is commonly associated with BenQ for some reason. Quite naturally though, it's actually Philips' technology; a component of the Nexperia chipset that QSI/Nu Tech uses in this burner.
At the original time of publication, we had a beta firmware for our drive that still recognized the drive manufacturer as QSI. Two updates later and a separate firmware tool for 40X CDR speed, we were finally up to date with the Nu Tech BX03 firmware. We were a bit surprised that Nu Tech released two firmware updates within a week of each other, especially since the drive itself is only a month old.
Here we can see a few more specifications about the drive. Our first InfoTool capture is using the original firmware shipped to us from Nu Tech. As you can see, the drive is still labeled as QSI and only uses 32X write capabilities.
Nexperia PNX7850: Powering the Nu Tech DDW-081
The Nu Tech DDW-081 is based on one of the newer Philips chipsets, the PNX7850. Philips is a great company for documentation, so you can read the whole whitepaper on the chipset here. The chipset itself is fairly basic — 32-bit MIPS RISC processor with DSP, DMA66 and audio processor. Obviously, manufacturers try to pull as much functionality as possible into the integrated processor; therefore, eliminating the cost of additional chips or additional processing power.Philips Reference design. Click to enlarge.
What bothers us about this chipset is that it only technically supports 4X DVD+R and DVD+RW. What further bothers us even more is that it supports 16X DVD read, while our DVD drive is only capable of 12X. However, features like 3mm scratch handling and adjustable laser strength (think PowerRec from Plextor) are comforting. Just recently, Nu Tech confirmed with us that the Philips Nexperia PNX7850 is in fact capable of 8X DVD+R because it has been optimized by Nu Tech/QSI engineers.
Click to enlarge.
Above, you can see the drive mainboard. Click to enlarge and you can identify the Philips markings on the big square chip.
Edit: Thanks to one of our readers, I have found out the Nexperia 7850 chipset does support 8X, although I do not know if it is the same implementation as with the Nu Tech DDW-081. Click here to read me. Interestingly, both chipsets still claim 16X DVD read speed.
Testing the drive
We recently upgraded our hardware test bed to allow for a more stable and powerful workhorse.Albatron 865PE Pro IIUsing DVD/CD Speed 2.01, we had run a battery of read, write and rewrite tests on the drive.
Intel Pentium 4 2.4GHz 800FSB
4 x 512 DDR OCZ PC3200 EL
Maxtor 80GB 7200RPM 8MB Cache
Windows XP SP1
Our drives CD and read speeds were very similar to the Plextor 8X 708A. We noticed that CD seek times were a little higher than average, but on the other hand, DVD speeds were significantly lower. The 110ms seek time for DVD+R/W's is almost 1/3 of the Plextor 708A seeks. Our tests find the Nu Tech DDW-081 about 15% - 20% faster seeking than the Pioneer A06.
Label | Rating | Average Transfer | Seek Random | Seek 1/3 | Seek Full | Media Length |
Ritek 97m31s01f (Cyanine AZO) | 52X CDR | 31.48X | 101ms | 110ms | 160ms | 69.59.51 CAV |
Mitsubishi 97m23s24f | 24X CDRW | 20.41X | 103ms | 113ms | 170ms | 74.41.01 CAV |
YUDEN000T01 | 4X DVD+R | 6.17X | 103ms | 120ms | 172ms | 4.38GB CLV |
MCC 002 | 8X DVD+R | 6.22X | 96ms | 116ms | 170ms | 4.38GB CAV |
Ricoh RICOHJPN | 2.4X DVD+RW | 6.22X | 109ms | 120ms | 182ms | 4.38GB CLV |
Unfortunately, near the end of a long burn or read, the drive began to rattle slightly. Although it does not seem critical, at least not yet, there is some concern that this rattle could damage the media or the drive. The eject time of the unit is a little slow — around 12.13 seconds.
Burning
Click to enlarge.
Above is an 8X DVD+R burn with some MMC media (CD Speed reports CLV instead of Z-CLV). Notice that the strategy is very similar to Plextor's; the burn starts at 6X and then adjusts to 8X Z-CLV. However, it looks apparent that there are some stability issues at that speed, since we see several stop gaps in the burn. Perhaps we are seeing the 4X Nexperia PNX7850 chipset showing its incapability to run out of spec.
Below are the CD-R, CD+RW, DVD+R and DVD+RW speed tests. We used DVD/CD Speed with the same configuration as the previous test.
Label | Rating | Average Write | Length | Mode |
Ritek 97m31s01f (Cyanine AZO) | 52X CDR | 23.48X | 74:43.00 | P-CAV |
Imation | 52X CDR | 29.32X | 74:43.00 | P-CAV |
Mitsubishi 97m23s24f | 24X CDRW | 9.95X | 74:43.00 | CLV |
RICOHJPN R00-01 (Imation) | 4X DVD+R | 7.72X | 4.38GB | Z-CLV |
FujiFilm | 2.4X DVD+R | 2.36X | 4.38GB | P-CAV |
YUDEN000T01 | 4X DVD+R | 3.91X | 4.38GB | P-CAV |
MCC 002 | 4X DVD+R | 7.62X | 4.38GB | Z-CLV |
Ricoh RICOHJPN | 2.4X DVD+RW | 2.37X | 4.38GB | CLV |
PHILIPS 041 | 4X DVD+RW | 3.92X | 4.38GB | P-CAV |
RICOHJPR01 | 4X DVD+R | 7.63X | 4.38GB | Z-CLV |
Compatibility on the drive was a little sporadic. Some of our Ricoh based FujiFilm, which is rated for 4X, only trickled out of the burner at 2.4X. Fortunately, this was the only media that wouldn't burn as advertised. We are not 100% sure why this happened.
Bit setting does not seem possible with this drive, which is a shame. Most drives based on Ricoh design are capable of bit setting the book mode to other formats. We have heard conflicting results claiming that this particular drive does; although with Nero, it seemed not possible. Using BenQ's bit setting tool was not supported by the drive.
Final Thoughts
Nu Tech has come a long way in 3 months. They have a sharp image and the backing of QSI to keep them competitive in the DVDR industry. While the DDW-081 does not disappoint, it doesn't exactly scream spectacular either. Fortunately, the drive is well supported. SonicDVD, Nero, Roxio, DVDDecryptor, InterVideo DVD Creator and Alcohol 120% all had no problems detecting and burning with the Nu Tech DDW-081.Our main concerns stem from the lack of 8X DVD+R media. While our current champion, the Plextor 708A, had no problems burning several brands of 4X media at 8X, the DDW-081 will only burn 8X certified media at 8X. The lack of bitsetting capabilities for the drive seemed disappointing also. Granted, our Plextor 708A does not support bitsetting either, but it does support DVD-R burn capabilities.
However, considering the extremely low cost of the unit, around $160, we have to give Nu Tech a lot of credit. If burning DVD-R's is not a problem, you save $100 over the Plextor 708A. Let us not forget also that Sony recently announced that their newest drive will not be supporting 8X DVD-R writes, and will debut at $270 (although the Pioneer 107 should support Z-CLV 8X). Could it be that DVD+R is pulling ahead in the “format wars”? Although it lacks the performance of the Plextor 708A, Nu Tech clearly wins the price grab.
Coming up later this month, we will have an exclusive look at the newer drives based on Pioneer's 107 8X DVD+/-R design, as well as dual format drives from Gigabyte and MSI!