Since this morning we can find another MSI review over at our friends from CDRLabs.com. A while ago they reviewed the MSI StarSpeed drive (32X/12X/40X) and now they've taken a look at a faster MSI model, the DragonWriter (40X/12X/48X):
 A few weeks ago we took a look at MSI's 32/12/40 CD-RW. To MSI's detriment their 32x writer was released amid a flurry of 40x writers, and users demanding the ultimate in speed looked elsewhere. However, the drive earned our coveted "Best Buy" award for delivering a good balance of features and performance at a very affordable price. MSI is not one to sit back and enjoy their success. They have thrown their hat in the performance arena with the "DragonWriter" MS-8340. |
Part of the Conclusion:
With a name like the "DragonWriter", you would expect the MS-8340 to burn up the competition. Unfortunately, this BenQ CRW4012P based drive did anything but that. Due to a relatively slow average writing speed, the MS-8340 took longer to complete our writing tests than most of the 40x writers we've looked at. What shocked me most was that the MS-8340 was actually a few seconds slower than MSI's 32x writer. So much for an upgrade. The drive's writing quality was not the best either. I found that most of the discs written with the MS-8340 contained a good number of writing errors.
The MS-8340 does have a good share of features. While the buffer is only 2048KB in size, it's backed up by BenQ's Seamless Link buffer underrun protection. In our tests it worked very well to prevent buffer underruns. The drive also offers a good number of writing speeds between 40x and 4x and something MSI's 32x writer was missing: a 10x rewriting speed. Last but not least, the MS-8340 includes a great software package including Ahead Software's award winning Nero Burning Rom.
So overall quite a disappointing result and it's thus no surprise the drive doesn't get a very high score. The drive gets an overall score of 7 but this is mainly due to its good features and easy installation. If you're interested in reading the complete review please click here.
Source: CDRLabs.com
