- Introduction:

has been a company that ships quality products at a very affordable price. Even if LiteOn doesn't lead the writing race, follows very quickly and previous models were a sales hit due to good performance/cost mark. With the announce of LTR-24102B, LiteOn enters the 24x writing race, following Sanyo's first 24x recorder. Could the new LTR-24102B model be an alternative for users who already thinking of buying Sanyo/TDK 24x and/or waiting for the Plextor PX-W2410A?

- Features:
The LiteOn LTR-24102B supports 24x writing, 10x re-writing and 40x reading speeds. The drive's exact writing/re-writing speeds are as follows - CD-R: 8X(CLV), 12X(CLV), 16X(CLV), 20X(Z-CLV), 24X(Z-CLV) and CD-RW: 2X, 4X, 8X, 10X (all CLV). The drive is also equipped with technologies that will eliminate buffer underruns, increase DAE speed and produce perfect writing quality. Let's give them an extensive look.

means Smart Monitoring & Adapting Recording Technology for Burning. To get the best burning quality & reliability with smart burning strategy such as media condition check, vari-speed burning, running OPC & buffer under run free technology. The basic philosophy can be concluded in the following picture:

As you can understand the LiteOn 24101 CD-RW contains a predefine list with good quality media. When the CD is in that list, the drive burns at a pre-specified speed with pre-defined writing strategy and you have the maximum writing speed. When an unknown disc is inserted the drive will burn it with specified speed, default strategy and running OPC at the same time. Last when bad quality disc is inserted, LiteOn 24x will burn at vari-speed in order to produce the maximum quality result.

LiteOn no more uses Sanyo chipsets for having anti-coaster technology, at least in the LTR-XX102B models... LTR-24102B still has such function which can avoid buffer under run. LiteOn calls this "Smart-BURN", LiteOn own technology, including smart burning strategy, such as media condition check, vari-speed burning, running OPC, etc. The chipsets for "Smart-BURN" come from MediaTek (MT1501E/0122-FYS/M4F20, MT1505E/0119-AYS/M4A29, MT1506E/0119-BYS/M4F18).

means Smart Monitoring & Adjusting Read-speed Technology -for- eXtraction. CD-DAE/VCD data extraction speed will increase or decrease by host system demand (lower for playback or higher for copy) & media quality condition.

means Zone Constant Linear Velocity technology. The data read/write rate keeps constant within a zone at the inner track then increases to higher constant rate at outer track as another zone. For example at 24X(Z-CLV) writing speed, the drive starts burning inner from 16X(CLV), switch to 20X(CLV) at 6min and switches to 24X(CLV) at 16min, this is so called Zone-CLV, 3 zone total. The drive also supports Vibration Absorber System (VAS) to reduce vibration & noise, Over-Burn and Raw mode copy.

- The package:
The package supplied was the retail European/rest of the world(?) version. This included: The drive itself, a quick set-up guide, 1 piece (24x certified) of Lite-On 80min CD-R blank (actual manufacturer Ritek), 1 piece of Lite-On 74min 4-10x High-Speed RW Blank (actual manufacturer Plasmon Data), audio cables and mounting screws. The software supplied with the drive was Nero Burning ROM v5.5.0.3b and Ahead InCD v2.26 (for packet writing use). There is not any printed manual included - just an electronic PDF file, which is -in our opinion- deficient, especially for the novice users.

The front of the drive is what we can call "generic". The drive doesn't even have the LiteOn's logo (it has the URL for the homepage instead) while doesn't also includes the "High-Speed RW" logo. You will notice that LiteOn has taken care that users will understand the drive's features easily, hence the "24x10x40x" logo. You will also find only one led, the eject button and the headphone input jack/volume selector:

At the back of the drive we will find the usual connectors (IDE interface, power), the jumpers for making the drive Master/Slave, the SPDIF output connector, 3 jumpers which are not used (factory reserved) and the analog/digital output connectors.

- Installation:
The Lite-On LTR-24101B was installed as a 'Master' in the primary IDE BUS. The drive worked in UDMA33 mode and after booting, identified itself as the "LITE-ON LTR-24102B". We unchecked the Auto Insert notification, checked DMA and rebooted. Note that even Nero reports the drive supports BURN-Proof this is not accurate, since LiteOn has now their own "Smart-BURN" technology.

The drive was a July 2001 model with firmware revision v5S01 installed. We used the Nero (5.5.2.4), InCD (2.26), CloneCD (3.0.5.1) and Padus DJ (3.50.799) for the recording tests.

- Test Machine:
WinMe OS
Soyo 7VCA
Celeron II 566 over clocked to 850 MHz
128MB SDRAM PC 133
WD 18GB UDMA 66
Quantum Fireball EX 6.4 GB UDMA 33
DAWI 2975 - PCI (ULTRA) SCSI Host Adapter
ATI AIW 128
Sanyo CRD-BP1500P firmware vHg.35
TDK CyClone 241040 firmware v6h.35
Lite-On LTR-24102B firmware v5S01