LiteOn SOHC-5232K combo - Printer Friendly version

1. Package - Installation

LiteOn combo SOHC 5232K - Page 1

LiteOn announced about 1 month ago its new Combo drive SOHC 5232K. We were very pleased when the drive arrived a few days ago. Without any unnecessary lose of time we immediately put our hands on the unit and started the scrutinizing tests.

The recorder is capable burning at speeds of 52x for CD+R media and 32x for CD+RW. Being a combo drive, it can also read DVD-R and DVD+R media at 16x (21,350KB/sec Max), apart from the CD-R reading at 52x.

Features

The SOHC-5232K recorder uses the Smart-Burn feature to prevent buffer under-run errors, and Smart-X which is used to adjust the read-speed for more stable results. Bellow are presented the specifications for the drive, as they have been declared by the manufacturer:

Specifications

Product specifications	52x32x52x CD-RW & 16x DVD-ROM
Tray type	Electrical load / eject, with emergency eject
Supported CD Media	CD-R & CD-RW discs ( up to 99min. ) DVD single / dual layer DVD+R / RW, DVD-R / RW
Recording modes	Orange-Book part 2,3 Volume 2 : High Speed & MMC2 commands Disk at once Track at once Multi Session Support Fixed and Variable packet Raw Mode Burning & Over-Burn VAS to reduce vibration & noise during recording & reading
Interface	Optical Drive: Standard IDE Interface
MTBF	70.000 hours
Physical specifications	Height 4,1 cm x Width 14,5 cm x Length 17 cm - Weight 900 gr
Environmental specifications	Operating +5° to +45° C Storage -30° to +60° C Humidity 15 - 80 % (no condensation)
Package includes:	•Nero Express version 5.5 •Power DVD XP • Manual • Quick Install Guide • Cables & Screws • Free helpdesk support • 2 years manufacturers warranty
System requirements	The minimum system requirements for the drive and complementary software: Pentium 166 MHz or faster CPU and 64 MB or higher RAM are required Compatibility with Windows 95 / 98 / NT4.0 / ME / 2000 / XP

The drive has a 2MB buffer memory, and supports Mount Rainier but it doesn't read or write DVD-RAM media.

The drive uses the RPC II region control, allowing a user to change the drive's region at most 4 times. For our tests, we set the region code to 2 (Europe).

- The drive

The package includes Ahead's Nero Express burning software and Cyberlink's Power DVD XP for DVD playback.

The warranty, a quick start guide, an IDE/ATAPI cable, soundcard connection cable and mounting screws complete the retail package contents.

The drive's front panel has nothing unusual or revolutionary. The plain white colored front with the Ultra Speed ReWritable and DVD ROM logos on the right and center respectively. Below from left to right are the headphone jack, the volume control, the power led and the eject button. The activity led turns orange during playback and blinking orange while burning. Also the emergency hole is above the volume control button.

On the rear panel there are the analogue and digital audio outputs (SPDIF), the IDE connector and the power input.

Removing the screws and opening the drive's cover voids the drive's warranty, so don't try this at home. For reference reasons, we post the following pictures. Click on the photo for an enlarged view.

- Installation

The LiteOn SOHC-5232K was connected to our test PC and was identified as "LITE-ON COMBO SOHC-5232K" under WinXP. All tests were executed with firmware revision VNK06.

The following pages include the test results for the LiteOn SOHC-5232K drive in comparison with 4 other drives of similar specifications. For the CD reading tests we used Freecom FC-1, TEAC DW-548D for the DVD reading tests and finally we compared the drive's CD writing speed and quality with the Optorite CW5201 and the Aopen CRW5232. We used these drives, to have a more realistic and concluding comparison.

2. Data CD Reading Tests

LiteOn combo SOHC 5232K- Page 2

Data CD Reading Tests

- Pressed CD (Click for CDSpeed results)

In the pressed CD reading test, LiteOn SOHC 5232K brought marginally equal results with the Freecom FC-1 drive except the starting speed where SOHC started the reading at a higher speed. With a final speed of 53,43x, the LiteOn drive overreach the manufacturers specifications for 52x reading.

LiteOn was somewhat slower that the Freecom recorder in the seek time test, especially in the full seek where SOHC needed 177ms. But despite the fact that SOHC was slower than FC, 177ms is a good score for a combo drive.

- CD-R (Click for CDSpeed results)

We made a copy of the previous pressed CD in order to test the drive's behavior with a CD-R media. Both drives' resulting speeds are similar and this proves the drives' stability. This time Freecom had higher speed at the end of reading.

Here too, the seek times are almost identical in contrast with the original media test. Again the LiteOn drive returned a quite slow full seek time.

- ReWritable Media (Click for CDSpeed results)

For the reading test we used 32x High Speed rewritable media from Mitsubishi Chemicals.

Both LiteOn and Freecom drives support 52x32x52 speeds. However they had different speed in CD-RW media reading. So, as it can been seen from the graph above, LiteOn was faster than Freecom, since the speed was 40x for SOHC and 32 for FC-1.

3. CD Error Correction Tests

Lite On combo SOHC 5232K - Page 3

Error Correction Tests

Many are the times in our daily computerized life we face scratched and defected CDs. There are drives with stronger error correction able to correct read errors coming even from big scratches and other trammels on the CD surface. One way to test a drive's reading effectiveness is the Almedio's ABEX testing system.

- ABEX TCD-721R

Errors total	Num: 176590116
Errors (Loudness) dB(A)	Num: 831475	Avg: -27.2 dB(A)	Max: -5.4 dB(A)
Error Muting Samples	Num: 376351	Avg: 1.2 Samples	Max: 3578 Samples
Skips Samples	Num: 52	Avg: 757.8 Samples	Max: 2939 Samples
Total Test Result	48.9 points (out of 100.0 maximum)

Unfortunately the drive's performance in this test was disappointing. The amount of errors during the reading process was high and the error loudness maximum level was -5.4dB, which is very high. The drive also skipped 52 samples after being unable to read some heavily defected areas.

- ABEX TCD-726

Errors total	Num: 11145
Errors (Loudness) dB(A)	Num: 48	Avg: -174 dB(A)	Max: -174 dB(A)
Error Muting Samples	Num: 0	Avg: 0 Samples	Max: 0 Samples
Skips Samples	Num: 0	Avg: 0 Samples	Max: 0 Samples
Total Test Result	100 points (out of 100.0 maximum)

The Abex TCD-726 test disc is generally easier to be read. So don't let the above flawless graph to fool you. But to be realistic the drive's behavior with the light scratches of the ABEX TCD-726 test CD was perfect. The problem occurs with scratches exceeding 1.500mm, as the ABEX TCD-721R test shows.

- CD-Check Audio Test Disc

Knowing how irritating it is to experience lapses when listening to music, the CDRinfo research team has decided to use a test to check the Audio quality and correspondence. CD-Check Test Disc is the tool for evaluating the Sound Reproduction / Error correction capabilities of a CD player. The disc offers a signal combination with disc error patterns to rate the drive's abilities to read music and reproduce it completely. Five tracks on the disc contain a sequence of progressively more difficult tests. These tracks are referred to as Check Level-1 through Check Level-5.

The tracks are reproduced (played) through a software multimedia player (i.e. Windows Media Player). Each level is considered as passed, if the tone coming out from the speakers is smooth, continuous without interruptions, skipping or looping. The higher the Check Level passed, the more reliable the sound reproduction of the tested drive is.

Error Level	1	2	3	4	5
Lite On SOHC-5232K	5/5	5/5	5/5	5/5	0/5

The drive successfully passed all the first 4 check levels, but it didn't manage to play the 5th track without lapses. The 5th track is very difficult to be read because it has a scratch of 1.500 mm size. Most drives fail to play the last track flawlessly, so we can say that the drive's correcting capability is normal.

- Summary

Test Disc

Reading Speed

Score

ABEX TCD-721R

Max

48.9

ABEX TCD-726

100

Average Score

74.5

Summarizing we can say that the drive could be better at correcting badly scratched discs, while other defects can be corrected adequately.The average outcome for the drive is 74.5 points.

4. DVD reading tests

LiteOn combo SOHC 5232K - Page 4

DVD reading tests

- Single Layer DVD-ROM (Click for CDSpeed results)

For getting more realistic results in the reading tests we compared LiteOn SOHC-5232K with the TEAC DW-548D. Both are combo drives and have the same 16x reading speed for DVD-ROM.

In the DVD single layer read test, both drives performed identically, reaching 16x as expected.

There's not a lot of difference in the seek times, but the LiteOn drive had the better seek times which means faster response to software commands.

- Dual Layer PTP DVD-ROM (Click for CDSpeed results)

The two layers of a PTP DVD-ROM disc are read sequentially with the drive starting the read process from the inner tracks on the disc, which is the beginning of each layer, and progressing outwards towards the outer tracks for each layer.

The pattern continues. Not a lot of difference amongst the drives. So far, quite good times for both drives.

Once more, the LiteOn drive was faster than Teac in the random and 1/3 seek time modes.

- Dual Layer OTP DVD-ROM

The first layer of an OTP dual layer DVD-ROM is read exactly the same way as the first layer of the PTP disc we tested previously. The difference here is the reading strategy of the second layer on the disc. The beginning of the second layer is located in the outer part of the disc, so the drive starts reading from the outer tracks inwards towards the inner tracks of the disc.

The LiteOn drive performance was streamlined, starting from 4x and ending the first layer at 8x. On the second layer the drive's ending speed was 4x, absolutely mirrored as the drive reads back towards the inner tracks. This is the normal behavior a drive should perform with CAV.

- DVD Recordable / Rewritable reading Tests

The chart below shows the Nero CDSpeed average reading speed results with the following media:

Both drives gave similar results, with LiteOn having the slight leading.

5. DVD Error Correction Tests

LiteOn combo SOHC 5232K - Page 5

DVD Error Correction Tests

In the following tests we examined the DVD reading capabilities of the LiteOn combo SOHC 5232K drive with scratched / defective DVD special media. For the tests we used CDVD Benchmark and Nero CDSpeed. The reference test media come from ALMEDIO.

- Single Layer media

ABEX TDR-821

This is a single sided, single layer DVD-ROM with a 4.7GB capacity, and its surface has an artificial scratch of dimensions varying from 0.4 to 3.0 mm. The following transfer rate picture comes from the CDVD Benchmark v1.21 transfer rate test.

The drive read the 821 test disc without reporting any reading errors.

ABEX TDR-825

This is also a single sided, single layer DVD-ROM of 4.7GB capacity, which has no scratches on the surface but it has defective areas ranging in dimensions from 0.5 to 1.1 mm. There is also a special defective area (for fingerprint simulation) with height between 65 and 75 micrometers.

The drive managed to read the defective areas on the disc without problems.

- Dual Layer media

ABEX TDR-841

ABEX TDR-841 is an 8.5GB dual layer, single sided DVD-ROM disc with artificial scratches of dimensions ranging from 0.4 to 3.0mm, on both layers.

The drive began normally, accelerating from 4x up towards the 8x, and manages to complete the test successfully. No read errors were reported.

ABEX TDR-845

This disc is a single sided, dual layer DVD-ROM disc with a capacity of 8.5GB. The only difference between the TDR-845 and the TDR-841 is that the first includes both defective areas and fingerprints. The dimensions of the defective areas range from 0.5 to 1.1 mm and the fingerprints have height sized from 65 to 75 microns (micrometers).

Both layers were read at approximately 8x. The defective areas did not pose a problem for the drive.

ABEX TDV-541

The TDV-541 is a single sided, dual layer DVD-VIDEO disc, with a capacity of 8.5GB.The disc is based on the TDV-540 series which is designed for inspection and adjustment of DVD-VIDEO players. The disc checks the layer switch operation from layer 0 to layer 1 and also includes test pictures and test signals for DVD sound files. The current TDV-541 also checks the error correcting capabilities of the drive and includes scratches sized from 0.4 to 3.0 mm.

The drive read had hard times to read the TDV-541 test disc. We encountered a drop of the speed acceleration, close to the end of the first layer. Despite the minor drop of speed in the beginning of the second layer, the disc was readable. However, playing the disc through PowerDVD confirmed that both layers were readable.

ABEX TDV-545

The TDV-545 disc is based on the TDV-540 series. It is a single sided, dual layer Video/S-2 disc with a capacity of 8.5GB. The TDV-545 includes artificial black dots on the disc's surface, sized from 0.4 to 1.0 mm. It also has 65 - 75 micrometer high fingerprints.

This disc seems to be no problem for the LiteOn drive. The black dots and fingerprints were bypassed without any effort.

6. Protected Disc Tests

LiteOn combo SOHC 5232K - Page 6

Protected Disc Tests

- Reading Tests

To create an image of the various protected titles onto a hard disk, we used Alcohol 120% v.1.4.8.1222 software and the appropriate settings, depending on the protection type of the inserted discs. Below are summarized the capabilities of the LiteOn drive, according to CloneCD software. The summary below shows that the drive supports writing of CD+G under RAW DAO:

The game titles we used for testing the readin gspeed for each protection scheme are given in the table below:

Game Title	Protection Scheme
PSX "NBA Jam Extreme"	Lybcrypt
Serious Sam The Second Encounter v1.07	SafeDisc v.2.60.052
VRally II	SecuROM v.2

PSX Pressed Media

SafeDisc v.2

SecuROM v.2

Although the drive gave good results ripping the SafeDisk and SecuROM protection schemes, the PSX ripping was very slow.

- Writing Tests

The LiteOn SOHC-5232K supports the DAO-RAW writing mode. For checking the drive's EFM correction status, we used 3 different game titles with different SafeDisc 2 and 3 versions with the latest software patches installed. After making the images of the various titles to the hard disk, we burned them (maximum speed) with Alcohol. Two different discs were created for each title; one with the "Bypass EFM error" enabled and one more with the function disabled.

The table below shows the results of the attempted backups and whether they ran (game installed / played normally), or not.

Drive

Game Title

SD2 Build

Settings

Bypass EFM error ON

Bypass EFM error OFF

LiteOn SOHC-5232K

Max Payne

v2.51.020

Yes

Yes

Serious Sam - The Second Encounter v1.07

v.2.60.052

Yes

Yes

The Sims Unleashed

v.2.8

Yes

Yes

The Sims Superstar

v2.9

Yes

Yes

Fifa Football 2004

v3.1

Yes

Yes

7. DAE Tests

LiteOn combo SOHC 5232K - Page 7

DAE Tests

- Pressed and CDR AudioCD results

We used a pressed audio CD to test the speed of the LiteOn SOHC-5232K. According to Nero CDSpeed, the average reading speed was 40.35x, while the reported seek times were very slow. This test confirmed the drive's 52x reading speed reaching a final speed of 53.43x.

We ripped the contents of a pressed audio disc to our hard disk, using the CDDAE software. The average ripping speed (burst mode) of 35.7x was quite good, outrunning Freecom FC-1 with an important headway. The same pressed audio disc was copied onto a CD-R and was read again with CDspeed. Once again LiteOn was faster that Freecom.

- Advanced DAE Quality

In the Nero CD Speed Advanced DAE test, the LiteOn drive returned an average speed of 35.45x, which is high speed, but the quality score of 50 was low and the great bunch of data errors is surely not something to ignore. According to CDSpeed the drive can read Leadin, Leadout, Cd Text and Subchannel Data.

- Support of 90/99mins AudioCDs

SOHC successfully playbacked and ripped the full contents of our 90/99min test discs.

- Reading/Ripping Protected AudioCDs

For the test procedure we used two audio discs with different audio protection schemes. We tested for both recognition and ripping to the hard disk. The software used was Exact Audio Copy.

* Pressed Audio disc protected by Sony Key2Audio (Celine Dion - New Day Has Come)

* Pressed Audio disc protected by Cactus Data Shield 200 (Natalie Imbruglia - White Lilies Island)

Drive

Key2Audio

CDS200

EAC

LiteOn SOHC 5232K

Audible playback problems

Audible playback problems

Freecom FC-1

Cannot recognize disc

Recognize the disc but cannot play or rip the contents

The LiteOn SOHC 5232K managed to rip the Key2Audio and CDS200 discs, but with some audible glitches in the first tracks. On the other hand, its rival could not even recognize the Key2Audio disc and play the CDS200 disc.

8. CD Recording Tests

LiteOn combo SOHC 5232K - Page 8

CD Recording Tests

- CD-R Writing Tests

The LiteOn SOHC-5232 supports 4x, 8x, 12x, 16x, 24x, 32x, 40x, 48x and 52x CAV writing speeds. Below you can see the CDSpeed writing simulation graph with Taiyo Yuden 52x CD-R media.

The writing process began at 23.36x and finished at 52.70x reporting an average recording speed of 39.90x. According to this, the manufacturer's specification of 52x recording is confirmed.

- Recording Times

We created an 80min data compilation with Nero Burning Rom and recorded it on a 700MB disc. The drive's recording time was 2:36 minutes, with 52x writing speed selected.

The chart below compare the writing times of the LiteOn SOHC-5232K with the Optorite CW5201 and the Aopen CRW232 drive at 8x, 12x, 16x, 24x and 32x with Taiyo Yuden media.

The LiteOn drive is one of the few drives that support writing in such a great variety of speeds. As you can see from the chart above, the other 2 drives we used for comparison don't support 8x writing.

This chart indicate the resulting time at 40x, 48x and 52x speeds. The same drives and media were used for the following comparison.

In the following graph you can see the recording times with various media brands. We selected the maximum speed (52x) for all the recorded discs, although the drive lowered this speed to 48x, with Mam-E and Creation media:

- CD-RW Writing Tests

The LiteOn SOHC-5232K supports 32x P-CAV maximum rewriting speed, with Ultra Speed rewritable media. Below are the results from the CDSpeed writing simulation test with blank 32x US-RW media from Mitsubishi Chemicals.

The test once again confirmed the drives specifications for 32x rewriting. The burning procedure started at 16.04x and finished at 32.17x having an average speed of 27.67x.

We also used Nero Burning Rom software to burn a data disc using 32x US-RW media from Mitsubishi Chemicals. The data compilation, which we burned, had a size of 651 MB. The duration of the recording process was 3:22 minutes.

Just for comparison, we provide the rewriting time of the Sony drive against those of the Optorite and LiteOn.

- Packet Writing Tests

Using InCD and Mitsubishi Chemicals 32x US-RW media for all Packet Writing tests. The formatted disc had 530mbs of free space. We copied a 403 MB file (412.822 KB) from the Hard Disk (on the same PC the recorder is) to the formatted RW media through Windows explorer (drag and drop). We repeated the operation twice, once with the MRW (Mt. Rainier packet writing) off and once more with the mode on.

INCD

Operation

Duration

Average speed

Read

3:26 min

13.3X

Write

2:25 min

18.9X

Mt. Rainier

Operation	Duration	Average speed
Read	3:29 min	13.1X
Write	3:45 min	12.2X

- Other features

Overburning

Up to 99 min

CD text reading/writing

Yes

9. 3T Jitter Tests - Page 1

LiteOn combo SOHC 5232K - Page 9

Writing Quality Tests - 3T Jitter Tests

On an 80min 48X CD-R disc from Taiyo Yuden we burned the same AudioCD project at 40x, 48x and 52x. The 3T Pit & Land Jitter graphs are presented here.

- 3T Pit results

Looking at the graph above, we can conclude that generally the LiteOn drive performed well. After the 70th minute the drive marginallyt slopped the limit of 35ns at all speeds except for 40x, where it reached a very good high level at around 30ns. Of course, this could not affect writing quality.

The average 3T Pit Jitter values for all recording speeds are illustrated in the following table.

The average Pit jitter for all recording speeds are very satisfying.

- 3T Land results

Again for 40x the performance is good. 48x can also be considered good even though it oversteps the mark with 37ns. At 52x, the Land jitter performance is good but it reached the high level of 43ns. Keep in mind that this happened only at the 80th minute.

The following graph indicates the good average performance at higher recording speeds.

Recording Speed	Average 3T Pit Jitter (ns)	Average 3T Land Jitter (ns)	> 35ns	Max 3T jitter values (ns)
40X	26.90	29.10	No	30 Pit, 34 Land
48X	28.80	30.44	Yes	36 Pit, 38 Land
52X	28.59	31.17	Yes	37 Pit, 43 Land