ForumLG GSA-H50N detail information
| Posted by | agent009 |
| Posted on | 18/07/07 07:51 |
| Number of views | 30075 |
| Manufacturer | LG |
| Product | LG GSA-H50N |
| Description | 18x Super Multi DVD Rewriter |
Conclusions
Conclusions
LG GSA-H50N is a new drive in the Panasonic-based LG drive line where it was preceded by GSA-4166B, GSA-H20N and GSA-H22N. It uses a refreshed Panasonic chipset that adds 10x DVD+R DL and 10x DVD-R DL support. Please see our LG GSA-H22N Super Multi DVD Burner Review to compare this drive to its predecessor.
LG GSA-H50N improves upon GSA-H22N by increasing burn speeds of DVD+RW, DVD-RW, DVD+R DL and DVD-R DL media but takes a slight step back in quality. Lossless linking at OPC (Optimal Power Control) points is not perfect when performed on DVD+R media, resulting in PIF spikes that were not present in LG GSA-H22N burns. While the spikes are harmless, a perfectionist might find them slightly annoying. On the positive side, burn quality of CD-RW and DVD-RW media has noticeably improved compared to LG GSA-H22N.
Regardless of a few minor glitches, LG GSA-H50N is a versatile Super Multi drive that performs reliably and supports all recordable and rewritable CD and DVD formats that exist today.
Here is a summary of what we believe are important positive and negative points about LG GSA-H50N:
Positive
- LG GSA-H50N reads and writes all CD and DVD media types
- Writing quality is good or excellent, with very rare exceptions
- Bitsetting is available and on by default for DVD+R and DVD+R DL media
- Short lead-in and lead-out times result in fast burns
- Excellent 18x single-layer DVD burn times, just over five minutes
- Excellent 16x single-layer DVD burn times, about five and a half minutes
- A fast CD and DVD reader, with the exception of CSS-protected DVD-Video
- A "two sheep" CD writer
Negative
- Questionable performance with 10x DVD+R DL burning
- Slow 8x CAV reading of single- and double-layer CSS-protected DVD-Video
- Somewhat slow 4x-8x Z-CLV DVD strategy leads to nine-minute burn times with 8x DVD media
Final thoughts
LG GSA-H50N is a worthy successor to the GSA-H22N that previously impressed us with its fast 18x burning and excellent quality. It remains one of the fastest and most consistent 18x drives on the market (let's face it, 20x burning has not matured yet).
To sum it up: "LG GSA-H50N is a reliable burner and an excellent choice for CD and DVD burning at 18x speeds. We recommend it."
Have a comment?
You are welcome to discuss this review or the drive in the comments below or in our forum thread: CDFreaks presents: LG GSA-H50N Super Multi DVD Burner Review.
Acknowledgments
We thank the following companies for providing media used in this review:
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Maxell USA - For providing Maxell CD and DVD media used in this review. |
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Memorex USA - For providing Memorex CD and DVD media used in this review. |
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Rima.com - For providing Taiyo Yuden CD and DVD media used in this review. |
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Ritek USA | Advanced Media, Inc. - For providing Ridata DVD media used in this review. |
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Verbatim USA - For providing Verbatim CD and DVD media used in this review. |
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ExtremeMhz - For providing Maxell 12x DVD-RAM media used in this review. |
One thing I would advise against is using any LG drive for TRT. Those drives have no problems with extremely poor burns. I have had a severely degraded Ritek G05 that would not read at all in any of my liteons, I put it in my LG and it did not slow down once during the rip. I've noticed this on a number of poorly burnt discs in the past and I have two LG drives to confirm that they are very good readers, too good when it comes to TRT.
This message was edited at: 22-07-2007 08:05
Many things besides the quality of the disc can go wrong at high reading speeds. 16x DVD speeds mean interpreting 56 meters/180 feet per second of track covered with microscopic bumps. It makes me think of reading highway signs written in Braille - at supersonic speeds
The whole thing is a bit of a black art... a reading test can show a hint of a problem where the quality test sees none, and vice versa. The best we can do is to pick one reading drive for a review and stick with it until there is an apparent contradiction between a quality test and a reading test, as was the case here.
O meu dvd não abriu o computador e não roda nada!!!
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