LaCie d2 DL DVD±RW Recorder - Page 15

Conclusion

External recorders are a very convenient choice for notebook users, or for users that just don't have any more space in their PC case. The first thing that end users will notice on this drive is the stylish aluminum case. The heavy aluminum shield with the black front panel with a small blue led that lights up when the drive is connected to a PC or Mac. The external enclosure has no fan, but the drive's temperature is not that high to make it necessary the use a cooling fan.

After the success of NEC 's ND-2500A drive, the ND-2510A aims to take its place. LaCie 's choice to use the ND-2510A drive makes the drive behave more or less like the NEC internal drive itself. However, we noticed some improvements regarding the reading process since the LaCie d2 DL drive does not produce any read errors with our DVD test media, as was the case with the ND-2510A. The LaCie d2 DL drive continues to be a rather slow reader, compared with other devices available on the market.

Looking at writing performance, the drive offers 8X DVD ±R/±RW recording. This is not the highest speed a user can find, since there are several 12X recorders available, but it still is a fast recorder, completing a successfull burn in almost 9:20mins. However, the supported media list should be extended. Many 8X -R media are burnt only at 4X and 3A -R media is burnt only at 2.4X.

The drive provides double layer media support at 2.4X, which is something new to external recorders. The recording performance at this speed was exactly the same as the ND-2510A. Booktype setting support is a minus for this drive, but LaCie will release a new firmware version to support bitsetting, along with better writing strategies and a wider media support list.

Following NEC's reputation, the LaCie d2 DL is a very good quality recorder. The quality scans we got were similar to those of the ND-2510A, with minor improvements.

CD-R recording performance was exactly the same as for the ND-2510A.

- The Good

• Same behaviour with NEC ND-2510A which produced excellent CD writing quality with low Jitter values
• Very good DVD writing quality
• Supports CD-Text (reading/writing)
• Supports audio protected discs.
• High quality aluminum shield.
• IEEE1394 (firewire) and USB2.0 support
• Can rip/read 90min Audio CD's
• Double Layer media support

- The Bad

• Low CD/DVD error correction ability
• Not many media (even 8X rated) supported at 8X
• RITEK DL media isn't supported with 2.04 firmware (will be supported in the next firmware release)
• Mount Rainier is not supported
• Cannot read or rip 99min Audio CD's
• Cannot create working backups with SafeDisc protected games over v2.60
• DAE speed only up to 32X

- Like To be fixed

• Faster ripping CSS DVD-Video performance
• More supported media for 8X/Double Layer
• Official firmware release to support booktype setting for +R/+RW and +R9 media