detail information

In this part of our Plextor PX-W4012TU review we'll start testing the reading of normal/unprotected data discs. Let's see how fast the Plextor drive can read data and if it can really reach the claimed 40x. For the tests we used Nero CD Speed and repeated the tests several times to make sure the results were accurate.

The data read tests are divided into five sections:

• Introduction
• Original/Pressed Discs
• CD-Recordable Media
• CD-ReWriteable Media
• Conclusion

Transfer Rate Test - Introduction:

Let's start with a screenshot of the detected Plextor PX-W4012TU read speeds with PlexTools. In the screenshots below you can also see some more information on the drive itself like firmware, interface and access time:

As you can see from the screenshot above this Plextor drive indeed uses the USB 2.0 interface and uses firmware version 1.02.

As you can see from this screenshot the Plextor PX-W4012TU can read all types of discs (Mode 1/2, Audio, CD-RW) at full speed. We will of course check that on this page of our review. The audio tests will be done on the next page. Besides the read information you can also see that the disc are being read in the CAV mode and that lower read speeds are being done in CLV mode.

Transfer Rate Test - Original/Pressed Discs:

For the transfer rate tests we used a pressed CD-ROM containing PlexTools v1.05 which was exactly 74 minutes (333.000 sectors) long. Below the produced graph with Nero CD Speed:

And of course the speeds and seek times of the Plextor PX-W4012TU drive:

In the left screenshot you see that the Plextor PX-W4012TU (like all Plextor drives) has no problems reaching 40x and going faster than that (the top read speed was 41.71x). The average read speed was 31.62x. The seek times with original/pressed media were however not that good as you can see in the screenshot on the right.

In the table below we compare the achieved times with other drives we've previously reviewed. The Plextor PX-W4012TU just falls behind the Lite-On LTR-32123S drive with its read speeds, although its top speed is a little faster:

Transfer Rate Test - CD-Recordable Media:

For the transfer rate tests with CD-Recordable Media we again used the PlexTools v1.05 disc only this time we read from a back-up disc. The disc used was a 'That's Write' CD-R certified up to 16x writing and manufactured by Gigastorage. Here's the ATIP information from CDR Identifier:

• ATIP: 97m 28s 12f
  
• Disc Manufacturer: Gigastorage Corp.
  
• Reflective layer: Dye (Long strategy; e.g. Cyanine, Azo etc.)
  
• Media type: CD-Recordable
  
• Recording Speeds: min. unknown - max. unknown
  
• Nominal Capacity: 702.83MB (79m 59s 74f / LBA: 359849)

The back-up disc was of course also 74 minutes (333.000 sectors) long. Below the produced graph with Nero CD Speed:

The speeds and seek times the Plextor PX-W4012TU drive reached with the CD-Recordable media:

In the left screenshot you see that the Plextor PX-W4012TU again has a high average read speed of 31.81x, a little faster than with the original media. With the CD-Recordable media the drive can also reach 40x and even faster speeds. The top read speed was 41.81x. The seek times with CD-Recordable media were again not that good as you can see in the screenshot on the right.

In the table below we compare the achieved times with other drives we've previously reviewed. The Plextor PX-W4012TU again just falls behind the Lite-On LTR-32123S drive with its read speeds, although this time its start speed is a little faster:

Transfer Rate Test - CD-ReWriteable Media:

To test the transfer rate with CD-RW discs we again used the "PlexTools v1.05" disc only this time we read from a CD-ReWriteable disc. We created a back-up of the disc using a PleXCombo PX-320A. The disc used was a 'Plextor CD-RW' disc. Here's the ATIP information from CDR Identifier:

• ATIP: 97m 27s 00f
  
• Disc Manufacturer: Disc ID not allowed
  
• Reflective layer: Phase change
  
• Media type: CD-ReWriteable
  
• Recording Speeds: min. 4X - max. 8X
  
• Nominal Capacity: 651.86MB (74m 12s 00f / LBA: 333750)

The CD-RW disc was of course also 74 minutes (333.000 sectors) long. Below the produced graph with Nero CD Speed:

The speeds and seek times the Plextor PX-W4012TU drive reached with the CD-ReWriteable media:

In the screenshots you can see that the Plextor PX-W4012TU drive can indeed reach 40x with CD-RW discs and has no problems going even faster than that. The drive reaches a very high average speed of 31.61x. The seek times with CD-ReWriteable media were pretty average as you can see in the screenshot on the right.

In the table below we compare the achieved results to some of the reviews we've done previously. The Plextor PX-W4012TU achieves the fastest read times compared to the other recorders:

Transfer Rate Test - Conclusion:

Overall we can say the Plextor PX-W4012TU drive is a great reader, like all Plextor drives. It has no problems reaching 40x and going even faster than that. The seek times of the drive were not the fastest we've seen but they were not that bad. The Plextor PX-W4012TU can read all types of discs at 40x and CD-ReWriteable media is no exception. The Plextor drive was the fastest CD-RW reader we've reviewed and beats our previous fastest model, the Yamaha CRW-3200E.

So far for the data reading part. Now let's check the audio reading (DAE) speeds on the next page...