detail information

After taking a look at the Sanyo's read performance it's time to check out what's really important, writing CD and DVD media. As we already mentioned the Sanyo supports 24x CD-R recording and 4x DVD-recording for both DVD-R and DVD+R media. Let's start with the drive's CD-R writing performance.

Writing Data CD-R:

For our data writing tests we simply set up a new compilation of 700MB using the Nero Burning Rom software. We used the DAO (Disc At Once) writing method. The disc was finalized and set-up as a non-multisession disc. In the screenshot below you can see the burn process completed successfully:

As you can see from the screenshot, the burn process was completed in just over 4 minutes. Not bad at all for a DVD-recorder since four minutes is more than fast enough for people who want to burn an occasional CD or two.

CD-R Write Quality:

For our CD-Recordable write quality tests we normally use Lite-On's WSES (Write Strategy Evaluation System) program to measure the amount of errors but for this review we're going to use the PlexTools Professional software. We did this for the simple reason that PlexTools works under Windows while WSES requires DOS to operate.

In the graphs below you can see an overview of errors occurring during the read process. Please note that every burned disc will always have C1 errors. These are errors that are corrected by the drive and they will not effect the disc in a bad way as long as their amount is limited. C2 errors are however very bad for a disc and are harder to read and correct. When there are CU errors present on the disc it means you have bad burned disc and it can't be read in the test drive you're using as a reader.

Also keep in mind that the number of C1/C2/CU errors depends on a number of different factors. The combination of software, hardware and read speed have an effect on the results. Since we're using different software in this review and a different drive for reading the disc, the results may be (a little) different than when using the traditional WSES software. Nevertheless all programs will give you a good idea of the quality of the written disc.

Imation - 48x certified - 24x write

The Imation discs, manufactured by CMC Magnetics, had a low amount of more C1 errors (2.9 average) and there were no C2/CU errors on the disc. A well recorded disc.

MAM-E - 48x certified - 24x write

The MAM-E discs, manufactured by Mitsui, had more C1 errors than the Imation discs but as you can see the number of C1 errors decreases throughout the disc resulting in an average C1 count of 8.6. A bit high but still not bad as there are no C2/CU errors on the disc.

Maxell - 40x certified - 24x write

The Maxell media had the lowest amount of C1 errors and was thus well recorded by the Sanyo drive.

So overall a good result but this is not a big surprise since the Sanyo uses a relatively low write speed (24x) while the discs were all certified for much higher speeds (40~48x). Let's continue with our DVD recording tests.

Writing Data DVD±R:

To test the Sanyo's performance when writing DVD media we set up a new UDF/ISO compilation of roughly 4475MB in Nero Burning ROM and started the recording process. We tested the drive's performance with both DVD-R and DVD+R media:

DVD-R

DVD+R

As you can see from the screenshots both discs were recorded in just under 15 minutes. The Sanyo's performance was however a little slower than the Plextor PX-504A drive which needed 14 minutes and 13 seconds when writing a 4473MB DVD+R compilation. Since the Plextor does not support the DVD-R format we cannot compare the write times for DVD-R.