detail information

Test machine:

For this review we will be using a computer with the following configuration:

CPU: AMD Athlon XP 1533 MHz
Bus Speed: 133 MHz
Motherboard: KT400-8235
BIOS: Phoenix 6.00 PG
Memory: 768 MB (60ns)
Sound: Avance AC97 Audio
Video: NVIDIA GeForce2 GTS/GeForce2 Pro
Hard disk: Western Digital WD1600JB-00EVA0 160GB.

System set-up:

The Toshiba SD-R5372 was connected as Secondary Master and identified as TOSHIBA CD/DVDW SD-R5372. DMA (Direct Memory Access) and autorun was enabled for all devices.

Software:

Windows XP Professional SP2 is installed on this computer. We will be using the following software in this review:

⋅         DVDIdentifier 3.5
⋅         Nero Burning ROM version 6.6.0.6
⋅         Nero CD/DVD Speed v3.70
⋅         Nero InfoTool v2.27
⋅         Slysoft CloneCD v5.1.0.0
⋅          K-Probe v2.4.2

Installation and supported features:

Our drive came shipped with firmware TU51. We quickly installed the drive without any problems. Upon installation, we immediately updated to firmware version TU53. We later updated to firmware TU55 to test the 8X DVD+RW and 6X DVD-RW capabilities, but the majority of the review was done utilizing firmware TU53.

 Toshiba's firmware update utility.

After a quick reboot we pulled up Nero InfoTool to obtain the following screenshot.

It is nice to see that the drive supports DVD-RAM reading. It does not support Mt. Rainier, but very few drives support this. The buffer size is listed as 2MB, however some other drives are built with an 8MB buffer. A larger buffer is preferred, but this is a minor complaint. All in all, the supported features look very good.

Here is another screenshot from Nero Burning ROM:

We notice that the Book Type Settings dialog is missing from Nero. Further testing indicates that this drive does indeed support bitsetting, which is a positive and can lead to better compatibility of DVD+R discs in older standalone players.  DVD+R and DVD+R DL discs are both set with the DVD-ROM booktype automatically on this drive. DVD+RW discs are given a booktype of DVD+RW.

Included software:

Here we will take a look at the software that is included with the drive. Please take note that we may not use the included software in the performance testing part of the review.

The Nero program suite is owned and developed by Nero Software; it contains programs for creating most types of CD/DVD discs, a packet writing program, a media player, etc. This is one of our preferred writing program suites, and we give Toshiba two thumbs up for including this in their retail package.

Now it's time to take a look at the reading performance! Head on over to the next page…