DatOptic SpeedBurn24 - Page 3

Performance

The DatOptic SpeedBurn24 drive we had in our hands gave more or less the same level of performance with the LiteOn 24102B we had tested in our previous tests. The external FireWire drive was easily installed and worked smoothly throughout all the writing or reading tasks we performed. The main difference was that the external drive used less CPU than the IDE drive as most of our tests showed. DatOptic SpeedBurn24 can be bought directly from CalOptic for a holiday special price of $189.

We tested the DatOptic IDE to Firewire card under Windows Millennium and Windows XP. We connected an IDE CD-RW drive through the card. The drives we connected through the Firewire card were an ACER CRW2010A (firmware vH.KF) and a Yamaha CRW3200E (firmware vT.3a). Both drive recognized under WinMe without any problem.

Under Win XP, the drives were not identified with their names, but Windows reported the new devices as "DAT OPTIC INC. IEEE 1394 SBP2".

For measuring the CPU usage we performed 2 major tasks:

a) Copy on the fly between the FireWire enabled drive and the Pioneer DVD 106S IDE DVD-ROM drive. For the copy process we used Nero Burning Rom v5.5.6.4

b) Copy from HD (image to CD). For that propose we used PlexTools v1.08 to create an image to the HD with Nero Burning Rom v5.5.6.4. Afterwhile we burned the image with the FireWire enabled recorder.

In both cases for measuring the CPU Usage, TaskInfo 2000 was beeing used. For double checking the test results we used the buld-in CPU monitor of WinXP, which gave similar results.

- WinME

- WinXP

Under WinXP we could't use the Acer 20x FireWire enabled drive since not only Nero but other CDR software (CloneCD) failed to recognize it. The main cause for this situation is that Acer CRW2010A doesn't return a complete ID string to the system but only "CD-R/W 20X10". Both Yamaha CRW3200E and other drives (Aopen CRW2440) we tested worked fine.

- Test Results

The above test results show that the usage of the IDE to Firewire adapter could save 8%-16% of your computer resources during any process that uses an IDE device. The profit in CPU utility is bigger under Win XP OS. Whether your processor gives you enough power or not for your daily needs, the IDE to Firewire convert card by DatOptics is an extra help to carry out a smooth and easy operation of your external IDE devices. In addition, the plug-and play capability the Firewire interface gives an easy and quick device connection and installation.

DatOptics 1394-IDE Bridge board comes in two versions, with ATA66 and ATA 100 support. The ATA100 drives costs $58 and can be obtained from CalOptic's.