detail information

Reading performance:

For these tests we will use Nero CD-DVD Speed to read various CD and DVD's, including audio discs and DVD-Video. According to the product box, this drive supports a specified read speed of 16X for DVD-ROM's and 40X for CD-ROM's.

Pressed CD-ROM discs:

For this test we used a pressed CD-ROM disc containing Canon Digital Camera Solution Disk ver 9.0 that is 73:12.38 minutes long. Below you will see the produced result:

We can see that the drive reads pressed CD-ROM discs exactly as the specification suggests. 40X CAV (Constant Angular Velocity) reading. Let us compare this to some other drives;

The ASUS DRW-1604P is one of the slowest readers and it has some of the highest seek times. The drive is slower than the competition because other drives can support reading CD-ROM discs up to 48x.

CD-Recordable discs:

For this test we made a copy of the original Canon Digital Camera Solution CD. The disc we used was a Verbatim 48X certified CD-R disc manufactured by Mitsubishi Chemicals Corporation.

The results look almost identical to the CD-ROM reading graph. The drive has no trouble hitting 40x on CD-Recordable discs.

Again we can see the drive is slower than some of the competing drives due to its 40x CD-R read limitation. Seek times are once again high.

CD-ReWriteable discs:

Again we made a copy of the original Canon Digital Camera Solution CD. The disc we used was a Verbatim HighSpeed 12X CD-RW disc manufactured by Mitsubishi Chemicals Corporation.

The drive reads CD-RW at a speed of 32x CAV (Constant Angular Velocity).

The drive is about average with CD-RW reading speed, but we would still rather see 40x or 48x CD-RW reading.

Audio - Digital Audio Extraction:

To test the digital audio extraction performance of the ASUS DRW-1604P, we again used Nero CD/DVD-Speed to measure the transfer rate. The audio disc we used is approximately 74 minutes long (74:02:70).

Here we can see that the CD-Audio reading speed is also 40x CAV with perfect DAE quality. Let's do another comparison!

The drive performs about average here, but the Seek Times Full are a little too high for our liking.

Advanced Audio - DAE quality test:

Before we move on to testing DVD read speeds, we perform one last audio test. This time we used the 'Advanced DAE Quality Test" feature in CD-Speed.

The drive performed as expected in these tests. The drive was able to read CD Text and Subchannel Data, which is a positive. Unfortunately it does not support reading from the Leadin or Leadout.

DVD Reading performance:

Again we will use Nero CD-DVD Speed to measure the reading performance, this time for various types of DVD discs. According to the specifications, the drive should read pressed single layer DVD-ROM discs at 16X.

DVD - DVD Video:

For our DVD reading performance tests we are going to start with single and dual layered DVD video discs. While only 1X speed is required to watch DVD movies, it is useful to be able to read the discs at higher speeds if you're going to extract (rip) the content of the disc to your hard drive.

Single Layer DVD Video

Double Layer DVD Video.

We can see that the drive is locked to 5x CAV (Constant Angular Velocity) for both Single Layer and Double Layer DVD Video discs. This 5x 'riplock' is not desirable and will annoy users who wish to rip their DVD Video discs at full speed.  How does this compare to other drives? Check the table below to find out!

The ASUS DRW-1604P cannot compete with drives such as the Memorex F16, that can read SL DVD Video discs at 16x. For comparison purposes we also tested a single layer data DVD-ROM disc and found that the ASUS DRW-1604P could indeed read the data DVD-ROM at full 16x CAV (Constant Angular Velocity).

DVD - DVD+R(W):

For this test we used a Taiyo Yuden 8X DVD+R and a RICOH 4X DVD+RW with about 4.4GB of data. Below are the results:

DVD+R

DVD+RW

DVD+R discs are read at 12x CAV (Constant Angular Velocity) and DVD+RW discs are read at 8x CAV. Again, we present a comparison table;

The ASUS DRW-1604P DVD+R reading speed at 12x is better than many other drives, but it would be even nicer to see 16x DVD+R reading and also faster DVD+RW reading speeds.

DVD - DVD-R(W) :

For this test we used a Taiyo Yuden 8X DVD-R disc and a Verbatim 4X DVD-RW disc filled with approximately 4.38Gb of data. Our test results are found below:

DVD-R

DVD-RW

DVD-R/RW reading speeds are almost identical to the DVD+R/RW reading speeds. 12x CAV on DVD-R and 8x CAV on DVD-RW.