DVD Tests

- Test Method

We used Nero DVD Speed v0.52 to run DVD tests (DMA enabled on all drives). All tests were performed at least 3 times with the same DVD title (we took the worst results). The DVD Speed author suggests avoiding the use of dual layer DVDs since performance might be lower than the actual one. For that purpose we used a single-layered DVD title, taken from PC Magazine.

- Nero DVD Speed results: (Press for ASUS E616 and TOSHIBA SD-M1612 CDSpeed results)

The faster drive in this test is LiteOn LTD-163. ASUS E616 starts at 9085Kb/s, lowers its reading speed during the test and finishes at only 14386Kb/s. That lowers the average reading speed down to 12639Kb/s. Toshiba SD-M1612 performed very well and comes second with 15384Kb/s.

ASUS E616 has the highest seek times among the five tested drives. In the "Random" test, the drive has 113ms, when almost all competitor drives have a lower than 95ms performance. Toshiba SD-M1612 gets the third place, and LiteOn LTD-163 gets the first place with 87ms.

- DVD Ripping Tests

We measured the DVD Ripping speed using Matrix DVD and DVD Decrypter v3.0.13. BTC 316B performed very well and earns the first position with an 11490kb/sec average ripping speed. ASUS E616 follows with 9110Kb/s and Toshiba SD-M1612 has the lower value with 5310Kb/s (3.83X):

- DVD R/-RW/+RW reading Tests

The chart below shows the Nero DVD Speed results of both drives with DVD-R, DVD-RW, DVD+RW media.

ASUS E616 has no problem to recognize all DVD writing/re-writing formats. The drive does read DVD-R media with an average speed of 7715Kb/s and lowers the reading speed with both DVD-RW/+RW formats. Toshiba SD-M1612 recognizes the DVD-R and DVD-RW media but refused to recognize the DVD+RW format. Note that the Toshiba drive is probably the only one that also supports reading of the DVD-RAM format.

ASUS E616 graphs for (DVD-R, DVD+RW, DVD-RW) and Toshiba SD-M1612 graphs for (DVD-R, DVD-RW)

- Movie Tests

We tested the DVD-ROMS with many DVD titles and our overall impression was very good. Both drives didn't have any problems with any DVD title we tested.