Yamaha CRW-F1 review @ CDRLabs.com

On CDRLabs.com we can find a review of the highly anticipated Yamaha CRW-F1 recorder. This drive (44X/24X/44X) does not have the fastest write times available today but its CD-ReWrite speeds are extremely high and besides that it offers some very unique features such as 'Audio Master Quality Control' and even more unique 'DiscT@2' with which you can write images to the unused part of your CD-Recordable disc:

Since we took a look at the CRW3200, Yamaha has been pretty quiet. While the competition has announced drives with 32x and 40x recording speeds, Yamaha has held off, developing what they consider to be the "ultimate recorder". At this year's CeBit convention, Yamaha debuted their secret weapon. Called the CRW-F1, this new drive featured 44x Full-CAV recording speeds along with updated versions of the revolutionary technologies we first saw on the CRW3200. What impressed everyone most was Yamaha's new DiscT@2 (pronounced "Disc Tattoo") technology. With the CRW-F1's DiscT@2 technology, you can now write your own text and graphics to the unused portion of your CD's.

While the CRW-F1's 44x writing speed isn't earth shattering, its 24x rewriting speed is. Rewriting at 24x is something that until now has been unheard of in the industry. While most other manufacturers are just beginning to introduce drives with 16x rewriting speeds, Yamaha has jumped into the lead with the first drive to rewrite at 24x.

Part of the Conclusion:

While I was very impressed with the features found on the CRW-F1, its performance came up a little short. After being bombarded for weeks by press releases touting the CRW-F1 as the ultimate recorder, I really expected the drive to blow me away like the Yamaha's 24x writer did. Instead, the drive had a very mixed performance. For example, while the drive's CD read and DAE speeds are rated at 44x, it had a hard time reaching these speeds in our tests. The drive's seek times were also higher than what we've seen on a lot of other 40x and 48x writers.

As I mentioned earlier, Yamaha has make some pretty bold claims about their drive's writing performance. As you'd expect from a drive with 44x writing speeds, the drives writing times came right in between most 48x and 40x writers. Like the 40x writers from Plextor and Teac, the CRW-F1 was not quite as media friendly as some of the other writers we've tested. There were only a few types of media that the drive would write to at 44x. The good thing is, the drive's writing quality is very good. I can't say that about too many of the 48x writers I've tested. And yes, 24x rewriting speeds are as impressive as they sound. Like you would expect, the CRW-F1 was twice as fast as the drives with 12x rewriting speeds and was even quite a bit faster than those that can rewrite at 16x.

If you want to read the complete review please check it out here. The Yamaha CRW-F1's performance wasn't that good but due to its unique features the drive still gets an overall score of 9.

Source: CDRLabs.com