Dual layer burning firmware for BenQ DW800A in Jan 2004? *updated*

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Posted by	Dan Bell
Posted on	05/12/03 02:06
Number of views	779

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Dual layer burning firmware for BenQ DW800A in Jan 2004? *updated*

used our news submit to tell us "There is no confirmation on the BenQ Website, but the person I got the information from is very reliable."

A reliable source inside BenQ Europe told me that a rumoured firmware upgrade to add Dual Layer Burning Capability to BenQ DW800A will be released in Jan 2004 . I heard Philips was working on this but their product would not be introduced before April/May 2004. It seems like BenQ has got a nice Late Christmas surprise for owners of a DW800A DVDRewriter.

Well, there you have it, an official rumor. But, we all hope it is true, if so it would be possible for more 8x drives. Is it or not? There has been talk of this before and even a response from Phillips . It has a very detailed explanation of the current state of this technology and the hurdles that must be faced. Discuss this issue in the Recording Hardware Forums . Thanks for the heads up misterxdvd, lets keep our fingers crossed!

Update, submitted by misterxdvd:

To be honest to you, here is some additional information i got today . My earlier source painted a to a to pretty picture and a more realistic release date is likely to be March/April . However the DW800A wil get a firmware update to support Dual Format in January 2004 , when at this moment DW800A only supports DVD+R(W) . It already supports changing of BookType , so this new function make many owners of DW800A very happy.

Source: misterxdvd

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Posted by ViperInc on Friday 05 December 2003 03:05

hype to drive up sales????

Posted by icepax on Friday 05 December 2003 07:00

How right you are. Same thing with the "leaked" Half-Life 2 source code. It's a load of horse **** -- ****! I'm sounding more like an American than Australian!

[offensive language replaced by asterisks]

~Crabby
[edited by Crabbyappleton on 05.12.2003 14:26]

Posted by GristyMcFisty on Friday 05 December 2003 12:51

Howdy there icepax!

Yeah it's probably all hype, not sure that I'm looking forward to this dual layer stuff since they probably won't play in my no. 1 DVD player. And the same may be true even for my "cheapo play anything" DVD players. So when this finally surfaces it could be a nice little earner for the consumer electronic industry as we all upgrade our machines.

Posted by Liggy on Friday 05 December 2003 13:50

We already got a new hint, that the update in January will only concern writing to DVD-R(W) and the ability for writing dual layer discs is to be added a few months later.
So you should not rely on this if you want to buy a new DVD burner.

Posted by cynicalbastard on Monday 08 December 2003 08:01

good luck finding dual-layer blanks

A classic case of sales hype if I ever heard it. The format(s) isn't even specced yet, as far as I know. Even if it were true, what's there to test on?

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