Reliable Random-Access Storage
Written: Sep 12 '00 (Updated Jan 15 '02)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Stable Media, Well Designed, Works Great (on a Mac)
Cons: Slow, Treat Media with Care, Runs Hot
The Bottom Line: This drive makes for a reliable archiving medium. Mac support is excellent. Windows still has growing pains.
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| gsearle's Full Review: QPS DVD-RAM Drive Burner |
I purchased this drive after having trouble with a magnetic removable media drive that I had to return. I decided to go with an optical format for stability, since it can't be accidentally erased, and there are no "servo tracks" (like in Iomega's Jaz and Zip drives) to be corrupted. It's slower, but it's great for archival purposes. This drive uses the Hitachi GF-1050 mechanism, which is getting great ratings by reviewers.
The DVD-RAM is true random access, which means that you can treat it just like any other disk. The media has some hard formatting on it which lets the drive know exactly where it is pointing the laser. This is unlike a CD-RW to which you must write data all at once, in big chunks, or "sessions". You must prepare for a CD-RW session, while you can just copy files to the DVD-RAM. It's much more convenient. Read access is comparable to a standard 24X CD-ROM, while write access is slower. If you are copying hundred-megabyte files, be prepared to wait many minutes. (Added Note: True random-access solutions are now becoming available for CD-RW. Soon CD-RW will truely replace the floppy drive.)
The software gives you choices as to the format of your disks. I strongly recommend UDF, or Universal Disk Format. You lose some small features of the driver, but you gain compatibility with other systems and drives. (This only applies to Mac; Windows is always UDF). You will be glad that you did if you ever need to read the media on another system. Formatting is really quick, as all the software needs to do is write a driver to the disk and format the initial directory blocks. The media is formatted as data is being written.
The drive stands up to a night's worth of write operations without any errors. It gets quite hot inside, though, and there is no fan. Eject a cartridge after intense use, and it will be quite warm. The heat doesn't seem to bother the drive or the media, however. I ran a complete read/write error check one one whole disk overnight as a "worst case" test, and it performed fine without a single error.
The drive itself comes with audio-output jacks and SCSI passthrough. Standard SCSI ID and termination switches are on the back. The power switch is also on the back. A power "brick" similar to a notebook's has a separate cable that runs to your power strip, so you don't need to find extra space on the strip for it. A SCSI cable is and a nice carrying case is included, along with one high-quality 5.2 GB Maxell media disk.
The front panel includes two dual-color lights that tell you exactly what the drive is doing, and what kind of media is inside of it. There is the standard eject button, a headphone jack for audio discs, and a volume control for the headphones. The Mac will lock the eject button, of course, so you will have to "put away" any media that you insert into the drive from the Mac OS. Some Windows software will also lock the button.
The drive tray is oversized to accept both DVD-RAM cartridges and standard CD-ROM and DVD-sized media. It will even accomodate mini-disks. There are tabs to hold the media if you decide to place the drive on its side. It won't accept CD cartridges. The tray requires a good push to get it to retract, which will move the drive itself, so I recommend using the eject button to retract the tray back into the drive. A little clumsy due to the oversize tray, but you get used to it.
The drive comes with driver software for both the Mac and PC. It also comes with a SCSI card which will work in both systems. If you have an older Mac, you can put this card aside. The software installs the drivers which allows you to use DVD-RAM media just like any other removable media (like a floppy or CD-ROM disc).
This drive supports DVD-RAM, CD-ROM, CD-RW, CD-R, and DVD formats. It will only write to DVD-RAM, and DVD-RAM cannot be read in a standard DVD drive -- it's a different format (although some DVD drives are starting to support it.) If you want to play DVD's on your system, you will need special software to do this. Try Power DVD. Your system will have to be fast enough to decode DVD compression, or you will need special decompression hardware, usually found on certain video cards.
Some Caveats:
Beware cheap media! I made the mistake of purchasing cheaper, HiVal media for the drive. Three sides (2 1/2 disks) were defective and couldn't be used. All of the disks had cases with narrow openings for the spindle. The spindle rubbed against the sides, shaved off a lot of plastic, and spun plastic dust and shavings all over the media. Go with the more expensive media -- it's worth it in the long run! DVD-RAM media is cheap compared to other magnetic formats (such as Jaz), so don't skimp.
Treat your disks right! Don't open the shutter. Don't touch the media. Keep the media in their sleeves when not used. Don't leave a cartridge hanging out of the drive. Don't remove the media from the cartridge (you won't be able to write to it if you do.) Dust is the enemy. These drives have built-in compensation for errors and dust, but even these safeguards can be overwhelmed, and you will lose data if you are careless.
Addendum: The above review was done with a Mac. The Mac went away with my last employer, and I've had to connect the drive to my Windows 2000 laptop. My particular hardware seems to be a bit flaky, and the only software that would work with my setup is VOB's InstantWrite (http://www.vob.de/). I've heard that the software that is bundled with the drive (SAI WriteDVD at http://www.softarch.com/) works great on other people's systems. I seem to have stabilized this setup, and read/writes to the drive are working great.
Update: Despite VOB's updates, extended writes to the drive under Windows 2000 always seem to fail. Performing Windows backups to this drive is not workable. During a backup, VOB's driver eventually reports that damage has occured to the disc. This means that the data cannot be counted upon to remain accessable on the disc. I now have a few discs with lots of information, but a blank directory -- I can't access the files at all. Implied by their silence to my repeated requests, VOB does not have an answer to this problem.
If you're a Mac user, great, but I cannot recommend this drive (or any other DVD-RAM drive) to Windows users based upon my experience -- the software support is still suffering growing pains. This is still "bleeding edge" technology, even though it's been around for a few years. I won't be able to use this drive seriously until VOB releases a solid piece of software, I get a Mac, or Microsoft finally incorporates acceptable support for optical drives into Windows.
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
gsearle
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Member: Greg Searle
Location: Nashua, NH
Reviews written: 27
Trusted by: 10 members
About Me:
Computer graphics designer and software developer with interests in technology, home improvement, and family life.
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