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Now that we've taken a look at how well the VisionTek drive can handle data protection it's time to see how well it does with protected audio discs. Audio discs are protected more and more and so it's important a drive can read these protections. For the tests we used Exact Audio Copy (EAC), Feurio! and CloneCD. In CloneCD we used the default 'Multimedia Audio CD' Profile.

Please note that the tests below were done with a different Lite-On LTR-48125W drive using a different test computer (OC-Freak's test machine ). The results however are exactly the same as for our review since the VisionTek Xtasy 48X is a rebadged Lite-On LTR-48125W drive...

Cactus Data shield 100:

For the Cactus Data Shield (CDS) 100 tests we used an audio disc with the title 'Westlife: World of our own'. On the back of the CD-cover we find the following text: "2001 Cactus Data Shield 100 by Courtesy of Midbar Tech LTD, Tel-Aviv, Israel" and a small CDS100 logo. For more information on Cactus Data Shield please visit www.midbartech.com.

Westlife: World of our own - CDS100

We fired up CloneCD and opened the disc tray. We selected the Lite-On recorder and let CloneCD close the tray. The tracks on the disc were detected but they could not be ripped. We had the same results with EAC. The tracks we be recognized but they could not be extracted. Feurio! couldn't even detect the disc inside the recorder.

Cactus Data shield 200:

For the Cactus Data Shield (CDS) 200 tests we used an audio disc with the title 'Natalie Imbruglia: White Lilies Island'. On the back of the CD-cover we again find the following text: "2001 Cactus Data Shield 200 by Courtesy of Midbar Tech LTD, Tel-Aviv, Israel" and a small CDS200 logo.

Natalie Imbruglia: White Lilies Island - CDS200

We again fired up CloneCD and opened the disc tray. We choose the Lite-On recorder and let CloneCD close the tray. We got the same results as with the CDS100 protected audio disc. CloneCD would recognize the tracks but could not extract them. The results with EAC and Feurio! were the same. They were able to recognize the tracks but were unable to extract them to our hard disk.

Key2Audio version 2:

The next protection we're going to take a look at is Key2Audio developed by Sony DADC. The disc we're using is 'Shakira: Laundry Service' protected with version 2 of the Key2Audio protection. On the front of the CD-cover we can read the text 'will not play on PC/MAC'. For more information on Key2Audio please visit www.key2audio.com.

Shakira: Laundry Service - Key2Audio 2

The results with the Key2Audio version 2 disc were even worse than with the CDS100/200 discs. All three programs (CloneCD, EAC, Feurio!) were unable to detect the disc, let alone rip the contents...

Key2Audio version 3:

For the Key2Audio version 3 tests we used an audio disc with the title 'Celine Dion: A new day has come'. On the front of the CD-cover we again find the text 'will not play on PC/MAC'.

Celine Dion: A new day has come - Key2Audio 3

We again fired up CloneCD and finally had some success. Although the drive failed to read sector 0 it could read the rest of the disc without problems. Our results with EAC and Feurio! were however not that good. EAC crashed when trying to detect the disc and Feurio! would fail to recognize the disc.

Conclusion:

The results were rather bad with only one CD being read by one program (the Celine Dion disc using CloneCD). So if you want a drive capable of reading protected audio discs you should consider other drives instead. This problem may be bypassed by using another reader that reads protected audio discs, as the Lite-On is perfectly capable of writing the discs.

Next up in our VisionTek Xtasy 48X review, writing CD-ReWriteable media and the Mount Rainier format...