LG GSA-4163B

LG GSA-4163B DL Burner - Page 1

LG Electronics, formerly known as GoldStar, was established in 1958 as the pioneer in the Korean consumer electronics market. Since then, a lot has changed in LG Electronics. In November 2000, Hitachi and LG formed a new joint venture to manufacture optical storage drives under the name "HL-DS". These recorders are well tuned and with unique features.

After the successful GSA-4160B model, LG releases its latest DVD burner, the GSA-4163B.

Below are the full specs for the drive:

Compatible Formats
Write	DVD+R, DVD+R DL, DVD+RW, DVD-R, DVD-RW, DVD-RAM, CD-R, CD-RW
Read	DVD+R, DVD+R DL, DVD+RW, DVD-R, DVD-RW, DVD-RAM, CD-R, CD-RW, CD-ROM Mode 1,2, CD-DA, CD-I FMV, CD-ROM XA, Mixed CD, CD Extra, CD-Text, Video CD, Photo CD
Write/Read Speed
Write Speed	DVD+R 2.4X, 4X, 8X, 12X, 16X DVD+RW 2.4X, 4X, 8X DVD+R DL 2.4X, 4X DVD-R 2X, 4X, 8X, 16X DVD-RW 1X, 2X, 4X, 6X DVD-RAM 2X, 3X, 5X(Ver.2.2) CD-R 4X, 8X, 16X, 24X, 32X, 40X CD-RW 4X, 10X, 16X, 24X
Read Speed	DVD-R/-RW/-ROM 10X/8X/16X MAX DVD+R/+RW/+R DL 10X/8X/8X CD-ROM 40X Max
Data Transfer Rate
CD	Max 6.0MB/S
DVD	Max 22.16MB/S
Average Access Time
CD	125msec
DVD-ROM/RAM	145/165msec

Below are the drive's main specs as given by NeroInfoTool and DVDInfoPro:

The drive uses the well known RPC II region control, allowing a user to change the drive's region at most 5 times.

- The drive / Retail Package

The LG GSA-4163B retail package includes the internal SuperMulti GSA-4160B burner, an IDE and an audio cable, four mounting screws, 2 CD-ROM discs and the warranty. The first CD-ROM disc contains the user manual and the second CD-ROM disc the bundled software which includes PowerDVD, PowerProducer Gold, Nero Express, InCD and Acrobat reader. No blank media is included in the retail package.

LG uses the same typical front panel available on most LG recorders. You can see the "Super Multi", "DVD+RW", "US-RW" and "DVD Multi Recorder" logos. However, there is still no DVD+R DL format logo.

On the rear you will find the analogue and digital audio outputs (SPDIF), the IDE master/slave/cs selector pins, the IDE connector and the power input.

Opening the device's case will void the warranty, so we advise against it. Instead, use the photos in this review for a closer look under the hood. Clicking on the image below will reveal a high resolution image.

Below is a photo of the main chipset used for this drive:

- Installation

The device was connected in our test PC and was identified as "HL-DT-ST DVDRAM GSA-4163B" under WinXP.

We received the drive with firmware version A100. We then flashed the firmware to the latest release, version A102. All writing tests in this review are made with firmware version A102.

In this review, we will be comparing the drive with the NEC ND3520A and Plextor PX-716A since all three drives have been recently released and have similar specifications.

- Testing software

In order to perform our tests we used: