For these tests we will use Nero Disc-Speed to read various CD and DVD’s, including audio discs and DVD-media. As already mentioned in the introduction, this drive supports:

• DVD-ROM 16x
• CD-ROM 48x

Pressed discs:

For this test we used a pressed CD-ROM disc containing the Roxio Media Creator 7.5 install CD that is close to 75 minutes in length. Below you will see the produced result:

The Lite-On LH-20A1L reached 47.40x read speed. Let’s compare it with some other drives below.

The Lite-On LH-20A1L proved to be one of the fastest drive at reading our test CD-ROM. Access and seek times were very good.

CD Recordable discs:

For this test we made a copy of the original Roxio Media Creator 7.5 install CD. The disc we used was a Ricoh 52X certified CD-R disc manufactured by Moser Baer India.

The Lite-On LH-20A1L reached 47.71x read speed. Let’s compare it with some other drives below.

The Lite-On LH-20A1L was among the fastest drives with our CD-R test disc.

CD Re-writable discs:

Again, we made a copy of the original Roxio Media Creator 7.5 install CD; this time we used a Verbatim Ultra Speed (32X) CD-RW disc made by Mitsubishi Chemicals Corporation.

The Lite-On LH-20A1L reached 34.13x read speed. Let’s compare it with some other drives below.

The Lite-On LH-20A1L was one of the slowest drives when reading CD-RW media.

100 minute CD-R:

The Lite-On LH-20A1L reached 52.69x when reading our test 100 minute CD-R and had no problems reading our 100 minute test CD.

Audio – Digital Audio Extraction:

To test the digital audio extraction performance of the LITE-ON LH-20A1L, again we used Nero Disc-Speed to measure the transfer rate. The audio disc we used is slightly larger than the disc used for the other tests, to be exact it’s nearly 79 minutes in length (78:53:31).

The Lite-On LH-20A1L reached 48.89x when reading our test audio disc. Let’s compare it with some drives below.

The Lite-On LH-20A1L performed well above average when reading our audio test CD.

DVD reading performance:

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

Pressed DVD Video:

For our DVD reading performance tests we are going to start with a single and Double Layered DVD video discs. While only 1X speed is required to watch DVD movies, it’s 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.

DVD Video (single layer)

DVD Video (double layer OTP)

DVD Video (double layer PTP)

The Lite-On LH-20A1L is not riplocked and read our single layer disc at 16x and our double layer test discs at 12x

The Lite-On LH-20A1L was about average when reading pressed DVD-Video media.

DVD – DVD+R/RW:

For this test we used a Verbatim 16X DVD+R and a RICOH 8X DVD+RW with about 4.4Gb of data. Below are the results:

DVD+R

DVD+RW

The Lite-On LH-20A1L was one of the fastest drives when reading DVD+R media and about average when reading DVD+RW media.

DVD – DVD-R/RW:

For this test we used a Verbatim 16X DVD-R disc and a Verbatim 6X DVD-RW disc filled with about 4.4GB of data. Our test results are found below:

DVD-R

DVD-RW

There are hardly any differences in the speed, compared to reading the DVD+R/RW discs.

Once again the Lite-On LH-20A1L was one of the fastest drives when reading DVD-R media and about average when reading DVD-RW media.

DVD±R DL discs:

DVD+R DL:

The Lite-On LH-20A1L read our DVD+R DL test disc at 12x reading speed.

DVD-R DL:

The Lite-On LH-20A1L read our DVD-R DL test disc at 12x reading speed.

DVD-RAM:

The Lite-On LH-20A1L read our DVD-RAM disc at 12x using a P-CAV reading method.

Summary:

The Lite-On LH-20A1L has excellent reading performance and is a very reliable reader

Now let’s head over to the next page where we will test CD-R/RW writing performance……

Features

CD-R/RW Writing performance