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Head-Fi's Sybil
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I mentioned I'd post my findings on the new PlexWriter 48A on my G4 thread a few weeks ago. Here they are.
First:
To any who might be interested: I purchased my black Plextor PX-W4824TA (internal) at newegg.com for $104 and change. My Oxford Bridge Firewire/USB 2.0 enclosure (an ELTRI525USB2FW) was $89.99 at ESBuy.com, who also provided free shipping.
When I asked OtherWorldComputing why they stopped selling Plextor drives, I was informed that the previous model "didn't perform well with firewire," which I took to mean they hadn't any in stock. (I've since decided that most of what OWC says is drivel predicated on the idea that Mac users are intimidated by technical matters and will have to buy compromised prefab devices for too much money in exchange for being able to harass tech support.) I ignored OWC's advice, crossed my cables and ordered the drive.
The plastic silver and dark gray enclosure I purchased is decent enough. Still, in retrospect, I wish I'd gotten the sturdy and cooling aluminum enclosure I wanted originally -- though it's true the one I have matches the Plextor, my graphite G4 and various other pieces of lacquered metallic reflective external gear.
My enclosure arrived with no instructions, of course. Which was fine for me, but technophobes might prefer to try GraniteDigital.com, who build world-class enclosures, provide extensive documentation and include in the package the best firewire cables I've ever seen (gold jacks and substantial shielded cordage with a diagnostic light at one end).
I chose to connect the drive via firewire alone, since most Mac owners do not have USB 2.0 cards and use firewire exclusively.
Checking System Profiler, I found my Plextor was recognized but not supported, which was what I expected. iTunes could find pre-recorded CDs but would not allow the Plextor to burn new ones without some sort of hack (such as modifying iTunes's PlextorCDR.device-plugin). I didn't explore that option because I prefer a bit more control than iTunes allows.
Fortunately, I'd recently upgraded to Toast Titanium 5.2, which recognized the drive immediately and allowed me to burn whatever I liked. (The 5.2 upgrade, which is available on the Roxio site, can be made to work a la carte by removing one item from a folder, but that's another story.)
Since the Plextor boasts of their products being "Burn-Proof," I decided to find out what that actually meant. As an experiment, I burned a music CD at 48X while running my favorite web browser (Chimera) and typing in Office 2001. The resultant disk, which took a little over two minutes to burn, was playable but had enough glitches to please Geez n' Gosh. But that's to be expected. In the first place, music CDs should be burned no faster than 24X; in the second place, the media has to be compatible. This wasn't; it was an early generic Maxell.
At 24X and with no extra computer ADD activities, my next disk, a TDK 24X certified TY, burned perfectly. And truthfully, I haven't made any other coasters with this burner.
I also tried to copy a few difficult source disks, such as the soundtrack to Argento's Suspira, which came with my limited DVD of the film and was designed not to work on computers. The Plextor got the disk to mount, allowed me to make a disk image and burned a copy. I did not resort to my Super Drive at all, which doesn't recognize the Suspiria disk anyway.
To my ears, the copy sounded unusually crisp and, apparently, that isn't an accident. The Plextor allows you to reposition the laser for added sonic fidelity. (Plextor calls this feature VariRec.)
I also made copies of other problematic disks, such as a scratched VCD from Thailand and a bootleg CD-ROM. Again, my disks all mounted, though they would not play on any other drive II own. The copies were quick and flawless.
The Plextor has other features as well, but to utilize them, I'd need updated software (which might not exist, since the 48A is a new model). One such feature is overburn which, theoretically, allows one to cram 94 minutes and 55 seconds' worth of music on an 800 megabyte CD. So far, Toast and other Mac programs I know of do not support this feature. Perhaps someone on Head-fi knows of a program that does.
My previous drive was a hoary Yamaha 4416 SCSI from five years ago, which I've always hated. Not surprising, really, that my new PlexWriter should seem heaven-sent by comparison. Even so, I daresay many here would be as impressed with the PlexWriter's performance as I. Burn-proof seems not to mean multi-tasking glee at ridiculous burn speeds, but that's fine with me. The drive makes perfect copies from flawed discs, never burns coasters if used intelligently, seems to ignore copy protection schemes (I'll be testing that capability more later) and sounds really good, too. I doubt I'll be using another brand for as long as CDs retain their cache(t). And I'll be checking irregularly to see if DVD-A and SACD formats are ever allowed to become sufficiently generic to allow burners to follow suit (despite suits of the legal variety). If that happens, I'll probably buy another Plextor.
Equipment: My Mac is a Dual G4 450 AGP (with a Pioneer 104 Super Drive) from two years ago. My OS is 10.2.2. My speakers are NS-10Ms, my preamp is the EAR+ and my amp is a vintage Technics "Class AA" SU-V120 with a phono stage that sounds much better than my Rotel. I have other equipment, of course, but it had no bearing on my present findings.
First:
To any who might be interested: I purchased my black Plextor PX-W4824TA (internal) at newegg.com for $104 and change. My Oxford Bridge Firewire/USB 2.0 enclosure (an ELTRI525USB2FW) was $89.99 at ESBuy.com, who also provided free shipping.
When I asked OtherWorldComputing why they stopped selling Plextor drives, I was informed that the previous model "didn't perform well with firewire," which I took to mean they hadn't any in stock. (I've since decided that most of what OWC says is drivel predicated on the idea that Mac users are intimidated by technical matters and will have to buy compromised prefab devices for too much money in exchange for being able to harass tech support.) I ignored OWC's advice, crossed my cables and ordered the drive.
The plastic silver and dark gray enclosure I purchased is decent enough. Still, in retrospect, I wish I'd gotten the sturdy and cooling aluminum enclosure I wanted originally -- though it's true the one I have matches the Plextor, my graphite G4 and various other pieces of lacquered metallic reflective external gear.
My enclosure arrived with no instructions, of course. Which was fine for me, but technophobes might prefer to try GraniteDigital.com, who build world-class enclosures, provide extensive documentation and include in the package the best firewire cables I've ever seen (gold jacks and substantial shielded cordage with a diagnostic light at one end).
I chose to connect the drive via firewire alone, since most Mac owners do not have USB 2.0 cards and use firewire exclusively.
Checking System Profiler, I found my Plextor was recognized but not supported, which was what I expected. iTunes could find pre-recorded CDs but would not allow the Plextor to burn new ones without some sort of hack (such as modifying iTunes's PlextorCDR.device-plugin). I didn't explore that option because I prefer a bit more control than iTunes allows.
Fortunately, I'd recently upgraded to Toast Titanium 5.2, which recognized the drive immediately and allowed me to burn whatever I liked. (The 5.2 upgrade, which is available on the Roxio site, can be made to work a la carte by removing one item from a folder, but that's another story.)
Since the Plextor boasts of their products being "Burn-Proof," I decided to find out what that actually meant. As an experiment, I burned a music CD at 48X while running my favorite web browser (Chimera) and typing in Office 2001. The resultant disk, which took a little over two minutes to burn, was playable but had enough glitches to please Geez n' Gosh. But that's to be expected. In the first place, music CDs should be burned no faster than 24X; in the second place, the media has to be compatible. This wasn't; it was an early generic Maxell.
At 24X and with no extra computer ADD activities, my next disk, a TDK 24X certified TY, burned perfectly. And truthfully, I haven't made any other coasters with this burner.
I also tried to copy a few difficult source disks, such as the soundtrack to Argento's Suspira, which came with my limited DVD of the film and was designed not to work on computers. The Plextor got the disk to mount, allowed me to make a disk image and burned a copy. I did not resort to my Super Drive at all, which doesn't recognize the Suspiria disk anyway.
To my ears, the copy sounded unusually crisp and, apparently, that isn't an accident. The Plextor allows you to reposition the laser for added sonic fidelity. (Plextor calls this feature VariRec.)
I also made copies of other problematic disks, such as a scratched VCD from Thailand and a bootleg CD-ROM. Again, my disks all mounted, though they would not play on any other drive II own. The copies were quick and flawless.
The Plextor has other features as well, but to utilize them, I'd need updated software (which might not exist, since the 48A is a new model). One such feature is overburn which, theoretically, allows one to cram 94 minutes and 55 seconds' worth of music on an 800 megabyte CD. So far, Toast and other Mac programs I know of do not support this feature. Perhaps someone on Head-fi knows of a program that does.
My previous drive was a hoary Yamaha 4416 SCSI from five years ago, which I've always hated. Not surprising, really, that my new PlexWriter should seem heaven-sent by comparison. Even so, I daresay many here would be as impressed with the PlexWriter's performance as I. Burn-proof seems not to mean multi-tasking glee at ridiculous burn speeds, but that's fine with me. The drive makes perfect copies from flawed discs, never burns coasters if used intelligently, seems to ignore copy protection schemes (I'll be testing that capability more later) and sounds really good, too. I doubt I'll be using another brand for as long as CDs retain their cache(t). And I'll be checking irregularly to see if DVD-A and SACD formats are ever allowed to become sufficiently generic to allow burners to follow suit (despite suits of the legal variety). If that happens, I'll probably buy another Plextor.
Equipment: My Mac is a Dual G4 450 AGP (with a Pioneer 104 Super Drive) from two years ago. My OS is 10.2.2. My speakers are NS-10Ms, my preamp is the EAR+ and my amp is a vintage Technics "Class AA" SU-V120 with a phono stage that sounds much better than my Rotel. I have other equipment, of course, but it had no bearing on my present findings.
