NEC ND-4550A

Review Pages

In the following tests, we check the drive's behavior when reading scratched / defective audio discs. The test discs used were the ABEX series from ALMEDIO.

- ABEX TCD-721R

Errors total	Num: 1789689
Errors (Loudness) dB(A)	Num: 115911	Avg: -77.4 dB(A)	Max: -35.8 dB(A)
Error Muting Samples	Num: 5585	Avg: 1.0 Samples	Max: 40 Samples
Skips Samples	Num: 0	Avg: 0.0 Samples	Max: 0 Samples
Total Test Result	75.3 points (out of 100.0 maximum)
C2 Accuracy	99.8 %

The performance with this specific test disc is very similar to what we saw from the ND-4551A. The total error count is very high but the error loudness is within the acceptable limits and most importantly, no samples were skipped. The Total Test Result score of 75.3 is quite good.

- ABEX TCD-726

Errors total	Num: 781
Errors (Loudness) dB(A)	Num: 1635	Avg: -81.7 dB(A)	Max: -59.4 dB(A)
Error Muting Samples	Num: 1	Avg: 1.0 Samples	Max: 1 Samples
Skips Samples	Num: 0	Avg: 0.0 Samples	Max: 0 Samples
Total Test Result	88.2 points (out of 100.0 maximum)
C2 Accuracy	100.0 %

Usually the 726 test disc does not present much of a problem for the majority of the tested drives. But in the case of the ND-4550A, the performance was not as good as we would expect.

- CD-Check Audio Test Disc

The CD-Check Test Disc is a very useful tool for evaluating the Sound Reproduction / Error correction capabilities of a CD player. The disc offers a signal combination with disc error patterns to rate the drive's abilities to read music and reproduce it completely. Five tracks on the disc contain a sequence of progressively more difficult tests. These tracks are referred to as Check Level-1 through Check Level-5.

The tracks are reproduced through a software multimedia player (i.e. Windows Media Player). Each level is considered as passed, if the tone is smooth, continuous without interruptions, skipping or looping. The higher the Check Level passed, the more reliable the sound reproduction of the tested drive.