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Final Tests and Conclusion Page 5 of 5
Final Tests & Conclusion:
As we carry on through testing we'll take a look at some media samples that didn't turn out so well. I've got a lot of Memorex DVD+R media around, and this drive unfortunately doesn't think much of it. Although writing was fairly fast with a P-CAV patter at 16x, reading back the disk yielded some interesting results as you can see below.
Memorex 16x DVD+R Write
Memorex 16x DVD+R Read
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Memorex 16x Jitter
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Memorex 16x PIPO
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Memorex 16x TA Test
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From here on out, things went downhill on single layer media as we tried some older disks and some generic media. Although they were written "successfully", the quality tests failed and I don't think that's a good sign.
Jitter Error
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PIPO Error
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Before we close up shop, we do have to show some DVD+R DL DVD writing results. For some reason, the writing quality tests wouldn't run at all with this disk in the drive, so all I've got is a write speed of an 8x disk that the PX-810UF can only write at 4x. This is followed by the read test of the same disk.
DVD+DL Write
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DVD+DL Read
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Even with the read test we see inaccurate results as the drive didn't hit 12x when reading the disk back as the graph indicates. With proper Dual Layer Media, this drive works very well though. We wrote several copies, backup up lots of data on DL disks and it all appears intact.
Conclusion:
While the Plextor PX-810UF promises a great drive in a nice package, it fails to deliver on several accounts. Instead of getting high-end Plextor hardware, you're paying for a rebranded LG GSA-H44N drive that can be picked up online for under $40. The drive ships with only a USB2.0 cable and excludes a firewire cable. Power is supplies to the unit through an external power brick, but still we find a fan inside the enclosure that makes quite a bit of noise and is distracting when the drive is not spinning at high speed. Writing quality is good enough, but not for a $139USD unit. For about half the price you can purchase a Samsung SE-184M drive that offers almost the same feature set, plus Lightscribe.
Plextor bundles good software and offers very good support, but I don't believe the premium is worth it for an LG drive in a noisy enclosure.
Pros:
- Give me a minute, I'm thinking. . .
- Good Software bundle.
- Good Warranty support.
Cons:
- Rebranded LG drive.
- Noisy enclosure.
- Mediocre performance on most media.
I would like to thank Plextor for sending us this unit for evaluation. If you have any questions or comments, please head on over and post them in our forum at the "Comments" link below. We'd love to hear your thoughts.
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