It’s interesting to note that when the CD was created, the managers of Sony and Phillips outlined the intended use of the CD and allowed the engineers to create it to those specifications. An efficient, clean process. On the other hand, when the DVD was being developed, all the existing copyright holders got together and fought to get their technology included in the final specification. So, the left-outs decided to pick-up their marbles and form their own alliance to include their copyrights, and compete with the original forum. This created confusion in the marketplace since many of the DVD players were incompatible with the later formats, having been released with the Forum DVD specification. A false start shortly after the initial DVD introduction, of the DIVX disposable rental discs that required a special player (which by the way is about to be tried again with a 48 hour, self-destructing, disposable disc that will work on all players), tended to further confuse the early adopters who were eager to grab this new DVD technology introduction.

Sony, the leading electronics innovator, decided to go their own route. After being a major force in designing the CD player, they had to settle for a small part of the CD burner market. Don’t feel too bad for Sony and Phillips though, they got a royalty fee on every blank CD made. We’re talken’ billions here folks. Anyway, where was I? Oh yes, their DVD drives. Sony had introduced DVD burner drives using the forum spec and then the alliance spec to a big ho-hum reception. So, they decided to leave the safe path and designed a DVD burner that would read and write to four of the five most popular DVD formats. The fifth format, DVD-RAM a rewriteable format that is best used for business archiving, uses a caddy to hold the disc. From the introduction of the DRU-500A last year, Sony hasn’t been able to build the drives fast enough to meet the demand, so don’t be looking for a bargain until the other drive makers play catch up. LG/Hatachi should have their new drive out by the time you read this that will handle all five DVD formats. Sony has recently released the DRU-500AX, an updated version with minor changes and the same price, $350. at CompUSA and BestBuy. GoogleGear on the net has it for $307 with free shipping. That’s down $47 from last month. This is a state-of-the-art machine that will backup data or record a movie (with the right video card, software, video capture card, a big, fast hard drive, and recent, fast computer rig) that will be read by most all recent DVD-ROMs, and movies that will play in all formats on most recent DVD players. I tried all four formats in DVD-Video mode and they played flawlessly on my year old Panasonic DVD player. When you insert a blank disc in the burner, it reads the ATIP on the disc and sets itself to work with that type of disc.

Note: Most of the discs on sale recently have been the 1X initial slow burning discs so if you have a faster burning drive, make sure to buy the version 2 or high speed discs. If you can believe the grumbling in the chat rooms, DVD burners are more picky about what brands of discs they will work with. Just remember, a few short years ago everyone was blaming the bad CDs for their coasters. And as with all new burners, go online to the makers site and download the latest firmware for your particular drive. Please do it before trying to burn your first disc and keep it up to date. It’s the way the drive maker corrects problems and adds new technology. With CD-Rs, it’s a 6 to 10 cent coaster. With DVD, it’s a dollar and a half to four dollar mistake.

So, it’s time to open the hood and see what this screamer is capable of. Here is the spec sheet:

SONY DRU-500AX

CD Write Speeds:
4x, 12, 16x, 24x (Z-CLV)

CD Rewrite Speeds:
4x, 10x, 16X

DVD Write Speeds:
1x, 2x, 4x (DVD-R); 1x, 2x (DVD-RW);2.4x, 4x (DVD+R); 2.4x, 4x (DVD+RW

DVD Read Speeds: 8x Max (DVD-ROM); 2x (DVD Video); 2x (DVD-R/RW); 2.4x (DVD+R/RW)

CD-ROM Read Speeds: 32x Max
CD-DA: 32x Max
Buffer Size: 8 MB
Random Access Times: 160 ms (CD) 200 ms (DVD)

CD Formats
CD-DA
CD-ROM
CD-ROM (XA)
CD-Extra
Video CD
Photo CD
CD-Text
Multi-session

DVD Formats
DVD-ROM
DVD-Video
DVD-R
DVD-RW
DVD+R
DVD+RW

CD-RW Recording Modes
Track At Once
Session At Once
Disc At Once
Multi Session
Fixed and Variable Packet Writing

DVD+RW Recording Modes
Random Write
Sequential Write

For buffer underrun prevention, Sony has their own system. For CDs, they use Power-Burn which will also lower the burn speed if the computer is having a hard time supplying the data fast enough. For DVD, they use Lossless Linking to preclude empty spaces when starting and stopping the burn to prevent buffer underrun.

The software bundle that comes with this drive is a good starting selection. Veritas DLA is packet writing software (like DirectCD) that when formatted will make rewriteable discs, both CD-RW, DVD-RW, and DVD+RW like a giant floppy. Really handy to off load your hard drive. Veritas also has Simple Backup to backup your hard drive to a DVD disc, and Record Now for CD and DVD creation, including music. Sonic Solutions MyDVD is improving after a lousy introduction, for video authoring. No, it won’t copy a copy protected movie, you need DVDXCopy for that. ArcSoft ShowBiz is a good lightweight video editor that’s easy to use to clean up your home movies. Cyberlink PowerDVD is a great software DVD movie player. I really like it. Easy to use and does the job. I wouldn’t even bother to load the last software program. It’s a time limited version of MusicMatch Jukebox. By the time you get used to using this monster, it will go brain-dead hoping you will send some money to revive it. I guess Sony never has figured out, one of the main reasons they couldn’t give away their CD burners, was their tendency to make their burners incompatible with the most popular burner software, and they included a lousy software bundle. It’s called proprietary interest and it’s bad business. It’s going to be interesting to see if this sweet burner is going to play nice with the most popular new DVD audio and video software.

My plan for teaching this more complicated DVD stuff is to use the CD/DVD Study Group meetings, the 4th Thursday of each month (except November and December) in the Alamo PC Learning Center in Crossroads Mall at 7 PM. No pre-registration, just show up if you are interested in burning CDs and DVDs. I recommend anyone serious about DVD please pre-register for my Basic CD Burning Class and Music CD Burning Class so you will have something to build on. If you are just curious, come on by. All Alamo PC members and their families are always welcome.