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Mitsumi CR-480ATE
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Posted by Dennis
Posted on 11/02/02 23:32
Number of views 3626
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Introduction
 

Mitsumi Europe

Review: Mitsumi CR-480ATE
Reviewer: G@M3FR3@K
Provided by: Mitsumi Electronics Europe GmbH
Firmware: version 1.0C
Production date: January 2002

As one of the first companies the Japanese Manufacturer Mitsumi is launching its new 32x IDE CD-Writer throughout Europe from the beginning of March this year. Codenamed the CR-480ATE, the drive can read discs at 40x, write discs at 32x and re-write discs at 12x. In this review we'll take a look at how well the drive performs and how it compares to 'standard' 24x recorders. Is 32x really a lot faster? How about the quality of the back-ups when writing at such high speeds? Read on and find out...

The Package:

In the package we find the following things:

  • The recorder
  • Mitsumi Software CD, containing:
    • Ahead's Nero Burning Rom;
      • Nero Burning Rom v5.5
      • NeroMediaPlayer
      • InCD / Packet-Writing
      • UDF reader
    • Manuals
    • Games;
      • SlotMachine
      • FloppyTerminator
      • Meteor Attack
    • Screensavers
  • One blank 32x 700MB CD-R (manufactured by Hitachi Maxell)
  • One blank 10x 650MB CD-RW (manufactured by Mitsubishi)

We were glad to see that Mitsumi ships Nero Burning Rom with their drives since it's our personal favourite. The Mitsumi Software CD has some nice additions like the games and screensavers but nothing too special. Since this drive is a test drive the retail package will be different from ours (for instance we didn't receive cables and mounting screws and although the Mitsumi CR-480ATE can re-write discs at 12x we received a 10x CD-RW disc).

Like all Mitsumi drives the front of the writer looks a little boring. There's no Mitsumi logo and only a "High Speed ReWritable" logo indicating the high re-write speeds of the drive. On the front of the drive we find a headphone jack, a volume control, a busy/write LED and of course an eject-button.

The back of the drive is the same as usual; the IDE and power connectors, the MASTER/SLAVE jumpers and the SPDIF (analog/digital) output connectors.

Test Machine:

For the tests we'll be using the following configuration:

Hardware:

  • Processor: AMD Athlon 700Mhz
  • Motherboard: ASUS K7V
  • RAM: 256MB (PC133)
  • Harddisk: Maxtor 30GB 7200rpm (UDMA 66)

System set-up:

    System set-up

Software:

  • OS: Windows Millenium Edition
  • VIA 4in1 Drivers: v3.37

As you can see the Mitsumi CR-480ATE was set-up as MASTER on the Secondary IDE Channel and identifies itself as "MITSUMI CR-48XATE". DMA (Direct Memory Access) and Autorun were enabled for every device.

Now let's take a look at the features of the Mitsumi CR-480ATE...

Conclusion
Features
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Reactions on this item
Posted by on Tuesday 12 February 2002 00:31
Can this drive burn working copies of PSX and PS2 games?
Posted by lanky on Tuesday 12 February 2002 03:07
Yes(Libcrypt protection) and Yes(if they are ripped).
Posted by mikeyspen on Wednesday 13 February 2002 22:17
Can anyone tell me how the Mitsumi CR-4809TE compares to this??? Does it incorporate all the same features? It will still work with CloneCD? Thanx!
Posted by on Wednesday 13 February 2002 22:26
The CR-4809TE is the 24x model right? Well if so a CD Freaks member is working a review right now! Should be finished soon so stay tuned :)
Posted by on Saturday 23 March 2002 16:44
Any experience with copying protected audio CDs? Or a tip which writer can copy them?
thx:7
Posted by on Thursday 28 March 2002 10:16
I've just had a look on the Mitsumi website (Europe) and the tech spec on this drive says it's only got a 2Mb buffer, NOT 16mb. As I have just bought an OEM version of this drive (yesterday) I am a little hacked off if this is actually the case....
Posted by on Thursday 28 March 2002 16:39
Hmm indeed/ I've [url=http://www.mitsumi.de/english/produkte/spec/cd480Ate.shtml]checked it[/url] and you're right. The buffer size indeed seems to be 2MB now instead of 16MB. I can assure you that our test model has 16MB as you can see in our screenshots of both Nero and CloneCD. I think Mitsumi must have decided to lower the buffer size (16MB is huge) to lower the cost of the drive. Buffer-memory is expensive. Nothing we (CD Freaks) can do about this. Thanks for letting us know!
Posted by on Thursday 11 April 2002 05:46
I have an OEM version of this drive, and it has the 2MB buffer. It does seem to work well, though, even with some year-old 12X Memorex CD's, which it burned nicely at 32X.
Posted by on Thursday 11 April 2002 08:34
Well, as I am running WindowsXP with a PlexWriter that does not work with XP, I would like to know that the Mitsumi drive works with XP.

Has anyone any experience about that?

:)
Posted by on Thursday 11 April 2002 13:19
All writers work under Windows XP... The Plextor should too and if it's not then something is wrong with your system. There are some problems with DMA under Windows XP (MultiWord DMA like the Plex 24x is using causes problems sometimes) but since the Mitsumi CR-480ATE uses UDMA33 it's fully supported under XP.

Good luck! :p
Posted by on Friday 19 April 2002 00:23
Hi, i'm just about to buy this nice Mitsumi burner. I'm from Slovakia in Europe and i can tell ya guys this CD-RW is the cheapest one in our country :))) i'm gonna buy it tomorrow :9 :d
Posted by on Thursday 09 May 2002 07:21
I bought a few days ago the Mitsumi CR-480ATE, which is promising a 16MB, buffer and was disappointed to get a 2MB buffer. On the genuine package Mitsumi registered 16MB buffer but the Nero software that is supported in the package reports just 2MB buffer. The same Nero software shows at your test a 16MB buffer. It looks like Mitsumi reduced the buffer capacity to 2MB and left the original printing of 16MB buffer on the package. If this is the situation this is a wrong way of marketing. Mitsumi does not have any "contact us" link on their web site, which makes you "angry" while you need to ask them about. It looks like customers are not so important to them. So take it into your consideration when you're going to by the Mitsumi CR-480ATE to these facts.
Posted by on Tuesday 14 May 2002 05:56
i have the 48xate, it was repackaged as a hival at office max. it has a 16 mb buffer and i only got it a month ago. i love it!
Posted by on Friday 26 July 2002 23:18
Naughty Mitsumi; naughty, naughty, naughty. Your 16 MB buffer has inexplicably shrunk to 2 MB. To save face, you might try sending your cute little Japanese wife to my place, tonight at 11:00.
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