SAMSUNG SH-W08A DVD±R/RW recorder- Page 6

- Reading Tests

To create an image of the various protected titles onto a hard disk, we used Alcohol v.1.9.2.1705 software and the appropriate settings, depending on the protection type of the inserted discs. Below, the capabilities of the Samsung drive are summarized, according to CloneCD software. As can be seen, the drive supports writing of CD+G under RAW DAO:

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

PSX Pressed Media

SafeDisc v.2

SecuROM v.2

Samsung managed to rip the contents of all test discs successfully. The Toshiba drive had the fastest times especially with SafeDisc where it was way faster than either the Samsung and TDK drives.

- Writing Tests

The Samsung supports the DAO-RAW writing mode. For checking the drive's EFM correction status, we used 3 different game titles with different SafeDisc 2 versions having the latest software patches installed. After making the images of the various titles onto the hard disk, we burned them (maximum speed) with Alcohol 120% v1.9.2.1705. Two different discs were created for each title; one with the "Bypass EFM error" enabled and one more with the function disabled.

• Fifa 2004 - Safe Disc v3.1
• The Sims Superstar - Safe Disc v2.9
• The Sims Unleashed - Safe Disc v2.8
• Serious Sam Second Encounter v1.07 - Safe Disc v2.60.052
• Max Payne - Safe Disc v2.51.020

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

While the drive managed to make working backups of all the game titles we tried, with SafeDisc version 3.1 (Fifa 2004), the burned CD played only on the Samsung itself. With SafeDisc versions 2.9 and 3.1, working backups were possible only with EFM on.