LiteOn LDW-811S DVD±RW recorder - Page 1

LITE-ON IT CORP. has released the LDW-811S half-height ATAPI / E-IDE 8x DVD Dual ReWriter. The drive is capable of writing DVD+R media at 8x, rewrite DVD+RW media at 4x, write DVD-R media at 4x, rewrite DVD-RW media at 2x, and read DVD-ROM media at 12x maximum. Based on MediaTEK MT1818E chipset, the drive is represents the Taiwanese proposal for fast DVD writers.

- Features

SMART-BURN technology provides Buffer UnderRun Free function and great media compatibility for high-speed writing DVD+R / DVD-R / DVD+RW / DVD-RW / CD-R / CD-RW media.

SMART-X technology provides smooth & stable Audio CD / VCD / DVD playback and high-performance DAE / VCD / DVD data extraction.

The LiteOn LDW-811S also uses VAS® technology to reduce vibration & noise during recording & reading.

- Specifications

From the specification table above, it can be seen that the LiteOn LDW-811S supports writing of DVD±R/RW and CD-R/RW media. The new drive offers 8x DVD+R (6-8x Z-CLV) recording, DVD+RW and DVD-R at 4x CLV, while DVD-RW can be burned at 2x CLV.

The maximum CD writing speed for CD-R is 40x CAV and 24x P-CAV when using Ultra Speed CD-RW media. Reading of CD-ROM/-R/RW can be done at 40x CAV maximum.

Single layer DVD-ROM media can be read at 12x CAV, while DVD±R/RW discs can be read at 6x CAV.

LiteOn used a 2MB buffer for the drive. The drive also supports RAW DAO 96 writing (CD).

The LiteOn LDW-811S uses the RPC II region control, allowing a user to change the drive's region at most 5 times. For our tests, we set the region code to 2 (Europe).

- The drive

LiteOn's complete retail package, includes two CD-ROMs, containing the Sonic MyDVD CD/DVD authoring software, CyberLink PowerDVDXP player, installation drivers and a pdf manual.

Two blank DVD recordable discs are also included in the retail package. One is a DVD-R disc from CMC Magnetics, and the other a DVD+RW from Ricoh.

A quick installation quide, audio cable and mounting screws complete the retail package contents.

The drive's front panel has the usual features. The tray door has the RW DVD+ReWritable, DVD R/RW, and Compact disc ReWritable logos located on the left, centre and right respectively. Between the DVD R/RW and Compact disc ReWritable logos is LiteOn's web url, www.liteonit.com. On the lower half of the drive, below the tray door, starting at left there are the headphones jack, volume control and power/activity led, and on the right the eject button. The emergency eject hole is located just above the volume control. The activity LED lights up green when busy and red when reading/writing is in progress.

On the rear panel (schematic included above for clarity) there are the analogue and digital audio outputs (SPDIF), the IDE connector and the power input.

Removing the screws and opening the drive's cover voids the drive's warranty. For reference reasons, we post the following pictures.

The LSI chip shown above, located on the upper side of the controller circuit borad, is from Kyoto-based semiconductor manufacturer ROHM CO., LTD. This IC contains a 3-phase Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) spindle motor driver, PWM driver for feed motor, and BTL driver for actuators. It is specifically designed for half-inch high disc drives which need to address the challenges of high speed and low heat generation in restricted spaces such as those imposed by notebook PCs.

The LiteOn LDW-811S further incorporates (located on the underside of the controller circuit board), a high-speed DVD dual Optical Disk Controller chipset from MediaTek Inc. consisting of two CMOS ultra-scale integrated circuits, the MT1816E and MT1818E. The MT1816E is the front-end analog signal processor and MT1818E is the servo control and Endec IC.

This chipset is suitable for DVD dual drives with both CD/DVD read and CD-R/RW, DVD-R, DVD +RW write functions. The general system specification is 8/8/4/4/48/24/48/16, i.e. DVD+R recording up to 8xS, DVD-R recording up to 8xS, DVD+RW recording up to 4xS, DVD-RW recording up to 4xS, CD-R recording up to 48xS, CD-RW recording up to 24xS, CD-ROM decoding up to 48xS, and DVD-ROM decoding up to 16xS. Moreover, it can support DVD-RAM playback, Mt. Rainier CD-RW/DVD+RW format, and true CAV mode recording functions. In addition, this chipset can support power saving function. Therefore, it can be used for both H/H and Slim drive. In the future, the intended product consists of the enhanced DVD dual drive, Blu-ray drive, AOD drive and Digital Video Recorder (DVR), etc. The enhanced DVD dual chipset can provide system specification of 16/16/8/8/52/32/52/16.

There are some innovative techniques developed in this chipset, including the optical servo control, disk ID & auto calibration, DVD-RAM read signal generator, robust automatic power control system, supporting Mt. Rainier format, MTK-SUPERLinkTM, programmable & flexible write strategy, support LVDS interface and true CAV mode recording technique, etc. Furthermore, since this highly integrated SOC chipset has excellence in system architecture and integration, there is significant cost reduction for the drive makers.

[The above is taken from the Taiwan Hsinchu Science Park's site, where MediaTek Inc. was awarded the Innovative Product Award for the development of this chipset.]

- Installation

The LiteOn LDW-811S was connected to our test PC and was identified as "LITE-ON DVDRW LDW-811S" under WinXP. All tests were done with firmware revision vHS0E.

The following pages include the test results of the LiteOn drive in comparison to two other dual DVD burners, the Optorite DD0401 DVD and the CyberDrive DX082D.