In both Clone CD3 which recommends that the drive be capable of reading and writing RAW+96 and Blind Write which claims DAO PW will copy virtually anything, my drive a Plextor 16/10/40A, is one said not to support RAW+96 on EB's website and while running Blind Write it says DAO PW is not supported.

How important is it that the drive support these formats for copying safedisc1, securom, and other protected cd's? I emailed John and he said that some Plextor's including my model support raw+96 and some don't but how can this be and can a firmware upgrade change this.

I'd really like to get Clone CD3 but don't want to spend the money if it won't work with my Plextor and is there any software I can download to test my drive and see what it actually does support???

Thanks, Plexman

The best things are always faster, quicker, and most of all more expensive...

First sorry for not answering yet but i guess forum answers comes first

As for your question now. RAW+96Bytes reading is needed only with PSX LibCrypt CDs ,at least for now. SD1/2 can be copied from CloneCD without any problem when using only the proper CD-RW drive.

Visit www.cdrinfo.com - The Recording Authority

(in reply to Plexman)

Have you made sucessful safedisc1&2 copies with your Plextor 16/10/40A and CloneCD3???

Also any truth to the rumor that upgrading your firmware disables some of the functions of the newer Plextor drives???


Thanks, Plexman

The best things are always faster, quicker, and most of all more expensive...

(in reply to Plexman)

Plextor 16x supports SD1 not SD2

As for firmware updates reducing capabilities...Hoax

Visit www.cdrinfo.com - The Recording Authority

(in reply to Plexman)

Thanks for the info John I was pretty sure the firmware rumor wasn't true. I've only backed up one Safedisc 2 disk and had to use a patch for it to work, I have the original so no big deal, but maybe Plextor will put out a firmware upgrade.

Thanks, Plexman

The best things are always faster, quicker, and most of all more expensive...

(in reply to Plexman)

yes plextor may release a new firmware that will solve the issue of SD2. and if you think again maybe not, and if that will ever happen will be in a distant future when the plex16 and plex24 are outdated by the DVD recorders and no one cares about cd's
bad luck that all of us owners of plex12 and plex16 that spent a lot of money buying these recorders when they came out and now they can't backup a simple protection like SD2 just because PLEXTOR doesn't want to

(in reply to Plexman)

ROOKIE + Plexman,
It is not a matter of firmware that Plextor 16/10/40 can't do SD2, its a hardware matter. The drive has to support 'Correct EFM Encoding' to produce perfect backups. As the new Plex 24X, Lite-On 24X and 12X, the new TEAC 24X and the ACER range oh and also some Phillips models. And ROOKIE its not because Plextor 'doesn't want to' because as I said earlier it is hardware dependent not f/w dependent...

You get what you pay for...

(in reply to Plexman)

plexman, if you haven't tried it you can download clone and run it as a demo for thirty day i think. then you would know for sure. i know people with these drives that use clone with no problems. it still won't do sd2 though, as clint says that is a hardware issue.

www.elby.de is the url for clone's site. it's hard to get there lately because of the traffic. (650,000 hits a day)

___________
netman
netman@cdrtimes.net

(in reply to Plexman)

Thanks Netman, Rookie, & Clint I appreciate the info looks like I might have to use Beta Blocker or one of the other software products to work around this issue.

I'd get the new Plextor but there's nothing wrong with my old one and right now I don't have any SD2 games to back up, plus I didn't have a dvd drive and since the Toshiba works so well with CloneCd I bought it and so far it's worked great.

I've already downloaded CloneCd3 but haven't tried it yet I have to uninstall the old trial version that expired and then install CLCD3 and register it. I was experimenting with blind read and write but had no luck at all and Plextor recommended it to me, plus as far as I'm concerned when I used the trial version of Clone it worked flawlessly but a little slow, had the speed locked at 4X or something!!!

I'll keep in touch and let you guys know how I make out and again thanks for the info!!!!!

Plexman

The best things are always faster, quicker, and most of all more expensive...

(in reply to Plexman)