(DEAD)CenDyne 24x10x40 $34.99, after $40 rebate & $25 coupon at OfficeMax

[Renthal]

I'm not sure what the "problem" is with the Acer drive? The only review I can find is for the 20x Acer writer. So far the Acer drive I received has worked flawlessly. Granted any new cd-rw drive is a big step up from my 2x2x6 that I've been using for what seems like eons now.

I mainly burn with rw discs, but I thought I would test the speed of the drive (with a cd-r) to see how it stacked up against what some of you have been saying in this thread. I burned a randomly selected set of files (off the HD), which weighed in at approximately 651 MB in 4 minutes 17 seconds. As I don't have any 24x 700 MB capable media, I can't test anything larger than 650 MB. However, if you calculate using 24x speed (3,600 KB/s), which the remaining 50 MB of the disc will be burnt at, you can reasonably say it will add another 14 - 16 seconds onto the burn time. I should add, I did this operation using two seperate burn programs, Nero and Roxio's Easy CD Creator 5, and they finished within a second of each other.

This December I built a system for a friend and installed the exact same model # Lite-On drive that everyone seems to want (not a Cendyne though). I recall having very similar burn times with it, but I never tested with a set size of 650 MB, nor did I perform the same burn multiple times to test repeatability.

Take this small test for whatever it's worth, but all-in-all the Acer drive seems to be a very capable burner.

 

[jlv]

I got just an email from the Cendyne rebate center telling me they've accepted and are processing my rebate. That's good, because my one other experience with OM rebates was horrible (the $45 Prime Peripherals rebate from about a year ago).

 

[JasonBottjen]

Just to throw my info in the ring....

I got the Acer drive like many others...

Here are the facts in my particular case:
1. Have burned well over a dozen CDs all at 24X. Have had NONE fail. And yes I was using my computer for other things at the time.
2. I have the drive hooked up as Secondary Master on my motherboard IDE controller (not slave like they were alluding to be necessary on CDRInfo.com)
3. The BIOS lists the drive as PIO4, but inside of Windows it clearly says the drive is running in: Multi-word DMA 2
4. During my CD burns, CPU Util NEVER went above 5% (machine specifics below)

So as far as I'm concerned, the Acer works fine.

Jason Bottjen

Machine:
Athlon XP 1500+
ECS K75SA motherboard
256MB PC2100 DDR Ram
GeForce 3 Ti 200 video
Windows XP Pro

 

[MysticMan1]

Just curious, but has anyone contacted Cendyne tech support CenDyne.com for some anwsers to the problems some people are having with setting up their drive to function properly.

 

[Renthal]

Ditto for me...Acer drive is hooked up to IDE-2 as Master. Pioneer DVD105-S connected to IDE2 as Slave. I accidentally started an "on-the-fly" copy and to my surprise it was no slower than caching the files to the hard drive first. Drive shows up as Multi-Word DMA-2 using WinXP Pro.

 

[Pocatello]

I've burned 11 discs with the Acer burner, and I have 5 disc failures, is this normal? My 8x4x32 Sony drive never had this high proportion of discs failure. I'm using nero that came with the Acer burner. I have my Acer as slave and my Sony as master.

 

[MysticMan1]

Pocatello

Have you tried updating the NERO software? NERO.com

 

[OrlandoTiger]

Reading all this controversy made me feel like I just fell into a religious hot deals thread...thanks for the memories

 

[MysticMan1]

OrlandoTiger.....(Reading all this controversy made me feel like I just fell into a religious hot deals thread...thanks for the memories)

LOL! Didn't you know that buying the proper computer hardware is a religious for some people. I think it's called Hardwareism.

 

[wasssup]

<<

<< I've never understood why people care so much about their companies, especially retail employees...it's not like the CEO is gonna give you a raise. I worked part time at some retail stores before college and always dealt with ridiculous people OBSESSED with their nationwide chain. I understand it must be annoying dealing with the person who calls up 10 times a day (i would too), but seriously --- why should you care if OM loses money or not? I doubt they're going to go out of business due to this incident. >>



I don't know about you, but I'd rather be dealing with an employee that gives a damn about his job/store/company than one who doesn't.
Because the one who doesn't is going to be giving you crappy service.
When you ask the indifferent employee to go to the back and check for the "Lite-on", he'll just run to the back room, jerk-off for 3 minutes, come back to you and say, "Sorry, couldn't find any."
You're not going anywhere fast with an attitude like that... definitely won't get promoted if I was the manager... >>



Well, retail sucks ass. If you put me in a position where I had to sell stuff to people, you're right, i'd go nowhere. Who knows what i'm gonna do once I graduate, all i'm thinking about is the kickass average starting salary for computer engineers and whether or not i'll be able to afford a lancer evolution within a few months (hey, I can dream)

 

[Lizardman]

I got my acer to work right finally. Just use the copy of nero that comes with your burner then go update nero to 5.5.7.8 and hopefully it should work fine. I burned a 700mb cd in 5minutes.

 

[ScrapSilicon]

5.5.7.8 the version number been using since 03/08/2k2. Acer just like any other drive...good ones and bad ones. 711MB CD on the fly copied..4:13 sec <edit> with the CyberDrive 32x12x48..tomorrow its Teac's turn in the box.

 

[vladgur]

<< Well, retail sucks ass. If you put me in a position where I had to sell stuff to people, you're right, i'd go nowhere. Who knows what i'm gonna do once I graduate, all i'm thinking about is the kickass average starting salary for computer engineers and whether or not i'll be able to afford a lancer evolution within a few months (hey, I can dream) >>



Wake up and smell the java. You missed the boat dewd. In case you havent noticed the country is in recession and there are more out of work computer "engineers"(you mean software developers or electrical engineers?) than there are jobs, so dont think that just getting a degree from just about any school will land you a computer-related job with a kick-ass starting salary(that of course is a relative term)...So, keep that retail job(I am assuming that if one was working in retail while pursuing the Computer science major has very little software-development experience aside from what they teach you in school)

 

[MysticMan1]

ScrapSilicon....(711MB CD on the fly copied..4:13 sec <edit> with the CyberDrive 32x12x48..tomorrow its Teac's turn in the box. )

4:13 sec for a 32 x drive sound a little slow. I would be surprise if your $35 24x TEAC didn't beat that time.

 

[ScrapSilicon]

<< ScrapSilicon....(711MB CD on the fly copied..4:13 sec <edit> with the CyberDrive 32x12x48..tomorrow its Teac's turn in the box. )

4:13 sec for a 32 x drive sound a little slow. I would be surprise if your $35 24x TEAC didn't beat that time. >>

..lol..why do you think there has been massive swapouts this week..hehe...CyberDrive 32x12x48..data(game CD) 593MB ..3:23..hmm...media is rated 24x..crud..that's the fastest rated media around here..note to self acquire 30+ rated media

 

[wasssup]

<<

<< Well, retail sucks ass. If you put me in a position where I had to sell stuff to people, you're right, i'd go nowhere. Who knows what i'm gonna do once I graduate, all i'm thinking about is the kickass average starting salary for computer engineers and whether or not i'll be able to afford a lancer evolution within a few months (hey, I can dream) >>



Wake up and smell the java. You missed the boat dewd. In case you havent noticed the country is in recession and there are more out of work computer "engineers"(you mean software developers or electrical engineers?) than there are jobs, so dont think that just getting a degree from just about any school will land you a computer-related job with a kick-ass starting salary(that of course is a relative term)...So, keep that retail job(I am assuming that if one was working in retail while pursuing the Computer science major has very little software-development experience aside from what they teach you in school) >>



Just wondering if you read the last few words in my post? you know, the stuff that looks something like "hey, I can dream" ...? And btw, computer engineers basically have to study most of the computer science AND electrical engineering classes - graduates with a degree in computer engineering were in high demand, at least when I entered college. Obviously thanks to the market's current state no way will I get a $50k starting salary (or I shouldn't count on it, at least). At worst I can expect $35-$40k, which is a damn good starting salary. To say that because the market's bad someone won't get a job is quite ridiculous, it just means you have to apply at MANY more places. Everyone I know who has recently graduated didn't get a job in their first few tries, but consistently (and persistently) applied EVERYWHERE. Guess what? My computer engineering friends are making $45-$48k/year before taxes. No, that doesn't mean I will make that much. Who knows.

 

[vladgur]

Yep, times have changed. When I graduated(end of 2000), people were not looking for anything under $70, my answering machine got slammed with 28 voice mails the first day i posted my resume... In any case, I hope youre not from Bay Area, because at $48K/a year you will have a tough time living. Im getting nearly double that and live from paycheck to paycheck(thanks to student loans, expensive housing, lousy investments and of course anandtech)

 

[emanon]

Just installed my Acer drive, along with the Nero software that came with it. Was surprised to find the software listed my maximum burn speed at 16x (this was prior to beginning the burn, or even inserting blank media). Went into Properties for the drive, and it lets me choose 1x thru 16x. The drive IDs as an "ATAPI CD-R/RW 24X10". WTF?!?

 

[Renthal]

All my burning software shows a max write speed of 24x. Try some other burning software and see what it says. Otherwise, check your firmware.

 

[emanon]

Easy CD Creator said the same thing. I uninstalled the drive, and reinstalled it. Time to head back upstairs and see what it says NOW...

 

[gswpete]

Finally got mine today, it was an Acer
But I found a Liteon at the OM in Milpitas. The lady there was really nice and helpful. And it seems that I got the last Liteon drive there.
First thing I noticed was how fast this drive seeks the cd's inside. I mean, you pop it in and it recognises it right away. Burns a 700MB cd in about 4minutes. Gonna update the firmware later on. All in all, a great deal for 35 bucks.

 

[striker21]

For the heck of it, I just visited www.cendyne.com, looking in their support area. I found a listing for the 24102B version of their 24X burner in the firmware section. However, when I tried to download it, the file appeared to be for a Ricoh 12x10x32x8 (whatever that 4th number means). Pretty odd...

 

[Kuhlman]

make some home VCDs and especially SVCDs from VHS tape

Gracjan:

What hardware and software are you using to make VCD's from VHS tapes. I'd like to do the same thing.

 

[cchen]

the cdrw will register as 16x if you use media that can only be burned at 16x

 

[JoeFoster]

I got a TEAC(CD-W524E). I have a question about cdr media and firmware updates on Windows XP. I have bought 2 spindles of Fuji media cdrs in past deals and I have taken off the plastic on both of the spindles for rebate purposes. I know that 1 of the spindles cdrs is rated at 16x and the other spindle had a 24x sticker. Does anyone know how I could find out which spindle is which speed?


How do you update firmware on cdr-writers and dvd-rom on Windows XP, put the firmware on a floppy?