NEC ND-4551A DVD-Writer Review

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Review:
NEC ND-4551A
Reviewer: Jan70
Provided by: NEC
Germany
Firmware: 1-07
Manufactured: December
2005

NEC Germany was kind
enough to send us one of their latest DVD-writer the NEC ND-4551A. This drive
supports 16x DVD+R/-R, 5x DVD-RAM, 8x/6x DVD+RW/-RW writing and 8x/6x DVD+R
DL/-R DL writing technology - allowing Double Layer discs of 8.5GB to be
written. Another interesting feature that this drive carries is the Labelflash™
technique.

Company
information:

Let us take a look
at some of the company information found at the NEC Germany
site:

NEC
Deutschland GmbH, based in Ismaning near Munich, was established as a
wholly-owned subsidiary of NEC Corporation in 1987.

The product portfolio
includes the most modern presentation technology, such as Video, LCD and DLP™
projectors and plasma monitors as well as peripherals such as CD-ROM, DVD drives
and floppy disks. Telecommunications products and biometric security solutions
round off the product range.

The sales territory covers Central Europe,
including Germany, Austria and Switzerland as well as the Benelux countries and
Eastern and South East Europe

Facts &
Figures:

NEC Group
Structure

NEC
Corporation will position its business on "providing integrated solutions
(including services) for mission critical systems in open environments" and
concentrate further on IT and network integrating solution
businesses.

NEC Electronics Corporation which concentrates its management
resources on system large-scale integration (LSI) business will strengthen its
global competitiveness, expanding its business as a specialist enterprise that
empowers its global customers by providing semiconductor solutions for high-end
system needs.

Through this new NEC group structure, NEC aims to increase
the corporate value of the entire NEC group.

If you are
interested in reading more company information, please visit: NEC
GERMANY

 

Drive specifications:

The official
listed specification of this drive was found on the NEC Germany
website:

What's inside
the box?

In this
section we will take a look at what the drive came shipped with and take a look
at the drive and its technology.

Front

Back

Top

Bottom

Left/Right Side

Below you will
see the contents of the retail box:

• The
  internal ND-4551 drive itself
  
• NEC Writer
  CD-ROM:
  
  
  
  • Documentation for NEC DVD
    Writer
    
  • Software
    documentation
    
  • NeroExpress 6.6 for Windows
    98, 98SE, ME, 2000, XP and 2003 Server
    
  • NeroVision Express 3 &
    ShowTime 2 for Windows 98SE, ME, 200 and XP
  
  
• MPC Audio
  cable
  
• Screw
  set
  
• IDE
  Cable

Now it's time
to take a look at the drive itself:

The NEC
ND-4551A uses the same bezel that previous NEC DVD Writers have used. A simple
and clean design that includes a few logos, a single green coloured LED, an
emergency eject hole and an eject button. (We would prefer different LED colours
to distinguish between reading and writing operations). The logos located on the
right side of the drive tray include a DVD
Forum DVD-Multi Recorder R DL logo, a DVD Alliance DVD+R
DL logo, and a CD-RW Ultra Speed logo.

Top

On the
top-side of the drive we found one sticker and we can read it was made in
Malaysia '“ December 2005.

Underside

On the
underside of the drive we can see a pattern of holes, which is used for
ventilation.

Side

On the back of
the drive starting from the left, we can see a digital audio connector; analogue
audio connector; pins and jumper to set the drive to cable select, slave or
master; IDE connector and finally the power connector.

We installed
the drive without any problems and here is a screenshot from Nero
InfoTool:

 

From the
screenshot of Nero InfoTool above, we miss Mt.Rainier and a larger buffer size.
Our drive came shipped with firmware 1-07.

Another shot
from Nero Burning ROM:

 

But let us continue
this review and see how it really performs.

 

On the next page we
will take a look at the test machine, the software, the drive
features…………

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Test machine:

For this
review we will be using a computer with the following configuration:

Hardware:

• Motherboard: Asus A8V Deluxe
  
  
• Processor: AMD Athlon 64 3500+
  (Venice) 1000 MHz Hyper Transport


• RAM: 1 GB Corsair Kit PC3200
  DDR


• GFX: MSI GeForce 6600 GT


• Sound: Onboard Realtek
  AC'97
  
• Hard
  disk: Seagate Barracuda ST3250823A
  250 GB

System
set-up:

The NEC ND-4551A was connected as Secondary Master and
identified itself as _NEC DVD_RW ND-4551A. DMA (Direct Memory Access) and autorun was enabled for all devices.

Software:

Windows XP
Professional is installed on the computer along with Service Pack 2 for Windows
XP. We will be using the following software in this review:

• Nero Burning ROM v.6.6.1.3 /
  v.6.6.1.4
  
• Nero CD/DVD Speed
  V4.11
  
• Nero Info Tool
  v3.07
  
• Slysoft CloneCD
  v5.2.7.1
  
• Exact Audio Copy
  v0.95 beta 4
  
• K-Probe v2.5.1 / v2.5.2
  

 

Features and techniques:

ACTIVE OPC

NEC uses
Active OPC Technology with its optical hardware. Active OPC constantly monitors
the sensitivity of the media and adjusts the laser strength to achieve the best
possible results. It does this by analyzing the reflection from the media's
surface.

8X DVD+R DL
writing speed:

The NEC
ND-4551A uses Z-CLV, (Zone-Constant Linear Velocity)
to write DVD+R9 DL at 8x. Three zones are used to write DVD+R Double Layer discs
at 8x. The average speed is 6.55x and total writing time is 18:35 minutes.

6X DVD-R DL
writing speed:

The NEC
ND-4551A uses Z-CLV, (Zone-Constant Linear Velocity)
to write DVD-R DL at 6x. Two zones are used to write DVD-R Double Layer discs at
6x. The average speed is 5.66x and total writing time is 20:41 minutes.

BookType
(Bitsetting):

The NEC
ND-4551A supports Bitsetting, and will as default write DVD+R DL media with
DVD-ROM BookType.

Here is how
you can check if your discs are really written with the DVD-ROM
BookType:

Start Nero
CD-DVD Speed and click the Disc info tab and you should get something like
this: 

DVD+R DL with BookType
DVD-ROM.

Another quick
test is to start Nero CD-Speed and look at the disc information:

This should say
DVD-ROM.

Quality
Scans:

The NEC
ND-4551A can be used to measure/scan burned discs for their quality via Nero
CD-DVD Speed. This can be handy to check and get an impression of which
state/condition the burned discs are in. (Quality scans performed on the NEC
ND-4551A drive can NOT be
compared to scans done with other DVD writers).

 

Now it's time
to take a closer look at the write technology used by the NEC
ND-4551A:

CD-Recordable:

The NEC
ND-4551A uses CAV, (Constant Angular Velocity), to write at
its maximum speed of 48X. This gives an average speed of 36.32x and a total
writing time of 3 minutes and 2 seconds.

For comparison
we have made the following table: 

As we can see
from the table, the NEC ND-4551A performed above average when it comes to
writing CD-R's.

CD-Rewritable:

The NEC
ND-4551A uses Z-CLV (Zone-Constant Linear Velocity)
writing technology to write at 32X for CD-RW discs, the average speed is 29.71x
and the total time 3 minutes and 11 seconds.

For a better
overview we present the following comparison table:

As we can see
from the table, the NEC ND-4551A performed above average on writing
CD-RWs.

16X DVD+R/-R
Writing speed:

The NEC
ND-4551A uses CAV (Constant Angular Velocity) to write
DVD+R at the maximum supported speed of 16x. This gives an average write speed
of 11.78x and a writing time of 6 minutes.

The NEC
ND-4551A uses CAV (Constant Angular Velocity) to write
DVD-R at its maximum speed of 16x. This gives an average write speed of 11.73x
and a writing time of 6 minutes and 4 second.

Below are some
write graphs from some other drives for comparison:

The NEC 3540A uses CAV
(Constant Angular Velocity) to write DVD+R at 16x. This gives an average writing speed of 11.81x and a writing time of 5 minutes and 58
seconds.

The Philips
DVDR16LS uses CAV, (Constant Angular Velocity) to write
DVD+R at 16x. The average speed is 11.33x and total writing time is 6 minutes
and 8 seconds. The average speed is lower and the writing time is higher than it
could have been due to the Walking OPC generation 2 using some time to
constantly adjust the writing quality, we could see this as constant dips in the
speed curve.

The LG
GSA-5160D uses Z-CLV,
(Zone-Constant Linear Velocity) to write DVD+R at 16x. The average speed is 11.60x
and total writing time is 6 minutes and 12 seconds. Below, we made a comparison
table:

*1 - Actual
writing speed was max 14x due to USB-Bridge limitations.
*2 '“ Actual writing
speed was max 13x due to USB-Bridge limitations.

8X DVD+R DL
writing speed:

The NEC
ND-4551A supports 8x writing speed on DVD+R DL media.

The NEC
ND-4551A uses Z-CLV, (Zone-Constant Linear Velocity)
to write DVD+R DL at 8x. The average speed is 6.55x and total writing time is
18:35 minutes.

6X DVD-R DL
writing speed:

The NEC
ND-4551A supports 6x writing speed on DVD-R DL media.

The NEC
ND-4551A uses Z-CLV, (Zone-Constant Linear Velocity)
to write DVD-R DL at 6x. The average speed is 5.66x and total writing time is
20:41 minutes.

8X DVD+RW
writing speed:

The NEC
ND-4551A uses Z-CLV, (Zone-Constant Linear Velocity)
to write DVD+RW at 8x. The average speed is 8x and total writing time is 7:21
minutes.

6X DVD-RW
writing speed:

The NEC
ND-4551A uses Z-CLV, (Zone-Constant Linear Velocity)
to write DVD-RW at 6x. The average speed is 5.79x and total writing time is
10:38 minutes.

 

Included software:

Now it's time
to look at the included software and to comment if needed. Notice that we may
not use the included software in our performance testing part of the
review.

The Welcome screen

Installation screen

Nero Express
v6.0 OEM:

Very good
software package - suitable for beginners as well as for experienced
users.

 

Now that we
have finished examining the drive and its writing strategies, it's time to head
on to next page, which is reading performance
test…

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Reading performance:

For these
tests we will use Nero CD/DVD-Speed to read various CD and DVD's, including
audio discs and DVD-media. As already mentioned in the introduction, this drive
supports:

• DVD-ROM :
  16x
  
• CD-ROM :
  48x 

Pressed
discs:

For this test
we used a pressed CD-ROM disc containing Creative Blaster Audigy install CD that
is close to 74 minutes long. Below you will see the produced result:

The NEC
ND-4551A reached 45.97x. Let's compare the result in the table below:

The NEC
ND-4551A performed average, reading pressed CD-ROM.

CD-Recordable
Discs:

For this test
we made a copy of the original Creative Blaster Audigy install CD. The disc we
used was a Verbatim 48X certified CD-R disc manufactured by Mitsubishi Chemicals
Corporation. 

Again the NEC
ND-4551A performed average on the CD-R read test.

* Some drives
including the NU HDW-164 will simply execute the seek command without actually
moving the pickup.

 CD-Rewritable discs:

Again, we made
a copy of the original Creative Blaster Audigy install CD; this time we used a
Verbatim Ultra Speed (32X) CD-RW disc made by Mitsubishi Chemicals
Corporation.

As we can see
above, the NEC ND-4551A is locked at 40x, reading CD-RW; now let us compare it
to other drives below.

The NEC
ND-4551A performed above average on CD-RW read test.

* Some drives
including the NU HDW-164 will simply execute the seek command without actually
moving the pickup.

Audio '“
Digital Audio Extraction:

We used Nero
CD/DVD-Speed to measure the transfer rate. The audio disc we used is slightly
larger than the disc used for the other tests, to be exact it's about 78 minutes
long (77:43:45).

The NEC
ND-4551A is locked at 40x while reading CD-DA discs. Let us compare the result
with other drives:

The NEC
ND-4551A performed average on the Audio-CD test.

* Some drives
including the NU HDW-164 will simply execute the seek command without actually
moving the pickup.

Below is the
results produced by EAC:

 Burst mode

 Secure mode

The drive
performed well in burst and slower in secure mode.

Advanced
audio '“ DAE quality test:

Before we move
on to testing DVD read speeds, we will take a last audio test, and this time we
used the 'Advanced DAE Quality Test" feature in CD-Speed. For this test we used
a CD-R DA media from MMORE (Thanks to MMORE (NL) for sending us this
media).

The extracting
quality is excellent and it should support everything, except reading the Leadin
/ Leadout.

 

DVD reading performance:

Again, we will use
Nero CD-Speed to measure the reading performance, this time for various types of
DVD discs. The drive should read pressed single layer DVD-discs at
16X.

DVD '“
DVD-Video:

For our DVD
reading performance tests we are going to start with a single and Double Layered
DVD video discs. While only 1X speed is required to watch DVD movies, it's
useful to be able to read the discs at higher speeds if you're going to extract
(rip) the content of the disc to your hard drive.

DVD-Video Single Layer

 
DVD-Video Double Layer (OPT)

DVD-Video Double Layer
(PTP)

As we can see
the drive reached 16x on DVD-Video Single Layer and 12x on DVD-Video Double
layer.

The NEC
ND-4551A performed excellent on the DVD-Video SL/DL tests.

 

DVD '“ DVD+R/RW:

For this test
we used a Verbatim 16X DVD+R and a Verbatim 8X DVD+RW with about 4.4Gb of data.
Below are the results:

DVD+R

 
DVD+RW

The NEC
ND-4551A is among the fast drives reading DVD+R and DVD+RW. Now let us see how
it will perform on DVD-R/RW.

 

DVD '“ DVD-R/RW:

For this test
we used a Verbatim 16X DVD-R disc and a Verbatim 6X DVD-RW disc filled with
about 4.4Gb of data. Our test results are found below:

DVD-R

 
DVD-RW

There are
hardly any differences in the speed, compared to reading the DVD+R/RW
discs.

Once again the
NEC ND-4551A is among the fastest drives reading DVD-R and DVD-RW.

Overall
thoughts:

The NEC
ND-4551A is a very good reader.

 

But now
it's time to head on to a more interesting part: Writing CD-R and CD-RW
discs…

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The
specifications of the NEC ND-4551A state that the drive is able to write CD-R
discs at 48x and CD-RW at 32x. Let us find out how the drive really performs in
speed and quality.

Writing Data CD-R discs:

For our data
writing tests, we simply set up a new compilation of 700Mb using Nero Burning
ROM software. Writing method used is DAO (Disc At Once),
and the disc is set up as a non-multisession disc with 'finalize disc" enabled.
The screenshot below shows how long it takes to write a disc at the highest
speed. (40x):

The drive used
2 minutes and 51 seconds to write the disc at 48x. Let us see how this compares
to other drives:

• NEC
  ND-4550A used 3 minutes and 5 seconds at 48x
  
• Philips
  DVDR1648 used 2 minutes and 50 seconds at 48x
  
• LG
  GSA-4167B used 3 minutes and 7 seconds at 48x
  
• Pioneer
  DVR-110D used 3 minutes and 34 seconds at 40x
  
• NU DHW-164
  used 3 minutes and 12 seconds at 40x
  
• Philips
  DVDR16LS used 3 minutes and 26 seconds at 40x
  
• Samsung
  TS-E552U used 2 minutes and 52 seconds at 40x
  
• LG
  GSA-4163B used 3 minutes and 15 seconds at 40x
  
• Philips
  DVDR1640P used 3 minutes and 17 seconds at 40x
  
• NU DDW-082
  used 3 minutes and 2 seconds at 40x
  
• Samsung
  TS-H552B used exactly 3 minutes at
  40x         
  
• Plextor
  PX-708A used 2 minutes and 58 seconds at 40x

 

Write Quality:

We will test
CD-R discs from different CD-R manufacturers. To really measure the write speed,
we used the 'create data CD" function in Nero CD-Speed. The discs were written
at the maximum speed that the drive supports. For the quality test, we used
KProbe 2 which is a tool developed by a Lite-On employee. It runs under Windows
and works with drives made by Lite-On. Also note that different drives and
different reading speeds may affect the results obtained when scanning the
discs. We used a Lite-On SOHR-5238S drive with firmware 4S09 and scanned the
discs at 48X speed.

A written CD-R
disc will always have some C1 errors; C1 errors are easily corrected by the
drive's error correction capabilities. The next level of errors is C2, while C2
errors could also be corrected by most drive's error correction capabilities;
they are not wanted on a good quality disc. A good disc should not contain any
C2 errors, and preferably have an average C1 error amount of below 2.0 for the
best discs, or at least below 10.0 averages for good quality discs. After C2
errors, there are only un-correctable errors that will make a disc unusable.

Below are the
obtained results:

Brand:	BenQ CD-R Thanks to Daxon for sending us this media
Manufacturer:	Daxon Inc.
Code:	97m22s67f
Disc Type:	CD-R
Recording Layer:	Dye Type 7: Short Strategy (Phthalocyanine)
Capacity:	79:59.74 (703MB)
Certified Speed:	52x
Write Speed:	48x
Write Time:	3m:5s
C1 Average/Sec:	0.66
C2 Average/Sec:	0.0

BenQ media with
average C1 errors of 0.66 - it goes into the group 'best quality discs"
category.

Brand:	EMGETON Qauarelle '“ Thanks to Bell Technology (CZ) for sending us this media.
Manufacturer:	Fornet International Pte. Ltd.
Code:	97m26s07f
Disc Type:	CD-R
Recording Layer:	Dye Type 7: Short Strategy (Phthalocyanine)
Capacity:	79:59.71 (703 MB)
Certified Speed:	56x
Write Speed:	32x (P-CAV)
Write Time:	3m:37s
C1 Average/Sec:	0.71
C2 Average/Sec:	0.0

The result is very
good.

Brand:	Maxell
Manufacturer:	RiTEK Corporation
Code:	97m15s17f
Disc Type:	CD-R
Recording Layer:	Dye Type 7: Short Strategy (Phthalocyanine)
Capacity:	79:59.70 (703 MB)
Certified Speed:	48x
Write Speed:	48x
Write Time:	3m:3s
C1 Average/Sec:	0.18
C2 Average/Sec:	0.0

Maxell media made by
Ritek, and with the C1 average of 0.18 it goes into the 'best quality discs"
category.

Brand:	Infiniti Samurai Lava Red '“ Thanks to Medea Inernational (UK) for sending us this media.
Manufacturer:	SKC
Code:	97m26s26f
Disc Type:	CD-R
Recording Layer:	Dye Type 6: Short Strategy (Phthalocyanine)
Capacity:	79:59.09 (703 MB)
Certified Speed:	52x
Write Speed:	32x (P-CAV)
Write Time:	3m:36s
C1 Average/Sec:	3.30
C2 Average/Sec:	0.0

Another good result,
but the media was only burned at 32x. 

 

Brand:	RICOH '“ Thanks to RICOH Europe (D) for sending us this media.
Manufacturer:	Moser Baer India Limited
Code:	97m17s06f
Disc Type:	CD-R
Recording Layer:	Dye Type 6: Short Strategy (Phthalocyanine)
Capacity:	79:59.74 (703MB)
Certified Speed:	1x-52x
Write Speed:	48x
Write Time:	3m:2s
C1 Average/Sec:	0.90
C2 Average/Sec:	0.0

RICOH media '“
manufactured by Moser Baer India Limited and with its average of 0.90 it goes in
the 'best
quality" category.

 

Brand:	Unbranded Printable. Thanks to SVP UK for sending us this media
Manufacturer:	Taiyo Yuden
Code:	97m24s01f
Disc Type:	CD-R
Recording Layer:	Dye Type 1: Long Strategy (Cyanine, AZO)
Capacity:	79:59.72 (703MB)
Certified Speed:	48x
Write Speed:	40x (P-CAV)
Write Time:	3m:26s
C1 Average/Sec:	0.13
C2 Average/Sec:	0.0

Media made by
Taiyo Yuden have always had a good reputation and with the average C1 errors of
0.13 it goes into the group 'best quality discs" category,
however this media was burned at 40x.

 

Brand:	Verbatim '“ Thanks to Verbatim (D) for sending us this media.
Manufacturer:	Mitsubishi Chemicals Corporation
Code:	97m34s23f
Disc Type:	CD-R
Recording Layer:	Dye Type 3: Long Strategy (Cyanine, AZO)
Capacity:	79:59.73 (703MB)
Certified Speed:	52x
Write Speed:	48x
Write Time:	3m:02s
C1 Average/Sec:	0.27
C2 Average/Sec:	0.0

Verbatim '“ a
well-known brand showed us a C1 average of 0.27 - it goes in the category 'Best
Discs".

 

Writing Quality with Re-Writable discs:

Due to requests from
our readers, we will add a few write quality tests with re-writable media.
Settings and testing procedures is the same as used earlier in this review, so
you may want to go back and read them if you are unsure. All discs used for
these tests have been written to before, but none have been written to more than
5 times.

CD-ReWritable
media:

Brand:	N/A '“ Thanks to Daxon for sending us this media.
Manufacturer:	Daxon Inc.
Code:	97m22s60f
Disc Type:	UltraSpeed CD-RW 16-24x
Recording Layer:	Phase Change
Capacity:	74:41.50
Certified Speed:	N/A
Write Speed:	24x
Write Time:	3m:35s
C1 Average/Sec:	14.70
C2 Average/Sec:	0.0

24x CD-RW media made
by Daxon, and we can clearly see that the C1 level is quite high in the
beginning on the disc.

 

Brand:	Verbatim '“ Thanks to Verbatim (D) for sending us this media.
Manufacturer:	Mitsubishi Chemicals Corporation
Code:	97m34s25f
Disc Type:	Ultra Speed CD-RW 32x
Recording Layer:	Phase Change
Capacity:	79:59.74 (703MB)
Certified Speed:	32x
Write Speed:	32x
Write Time:	3m:11s
C1 Average/Sec:	6.01
C2 Average/Sec:	0.0

The result is very
good.

Summary:

The CD-R writing quality is
excellent, and the CD-RW quality is very good.

 

So let us
head on to next page and read about DVD-Writing
performance…

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The
specifications of this drive tell us that it should write DVD±R at 16x and
DVD+RW/-RW at 8x/6x. In this part, we will measure the writing times for various
types of DVD+R/RW and DVD-R/RW discs. We will also focus on write quality and
media compatibility.

DVD-Writing performance:

In this test
we will measure the time for writing to DVD±R discs. We used Nero Burning Rom to
burn an ISO compilation containing 4483Mb of data. We used the Disc-At-Once
write method.

DVD+R

DVD-R

Look below for
the results.

The
results are respectable, but let us see how the writing quality is.

 

Write quality:

You should first
notice that this is not a scientific and professional way to test the discs. But
according to our testing done in recent months, we would conclude that there is
a clear link between the quality reported when scanning the disc and the
playability of the disc in different devices. Also notice that different drives
report different amounts of errors. K-Probe was designed to work with
Lite-On
DVD-Writers, so we recommend
using a DVD-Writer from Lite-On. In this test we
use a Lite-On SHW-1635S and
SHM-165P6S DVD-Writer, as already said; remember that scans done with a
Lite-On
DVD-ROM or Lite-On combo
drive can't be compared with the results obtained with a Lite-On
DVD-Writer. Also remember that
different PI/PO ECC sum settings along
with different reading speeds in K-Probe will affect the result, we use these
settings;  PI (Parity Inner) set to summarize 8
ECC blocks,
PIF
(Parity Inner Failures) set
to summarize 1 ECC block,
reading speed: 4X CLV
(Constant Linear Velocity). Setting the PI sum to 8 and the
PIF sum to 1 will give
a result that we may compare to the standards for DVD+R/RW and
DVD-R/RW.

But what is a good
scan? That is a discussion that we don't think will end soon, as different
drives report different amount of errors, some players are more picky about
media than others, and so on. But as a comparison we present you with a scan
from two pressed DVD discs:

This scan shows the results from a pressed DVD-Video disc
(GoldenEye).

 

This scan shows the
result from a pressed DVD-Video disk (The Green Mile). Notice the error jump
when shifting to the second layer (the error level actually drops from the end
of the first layer to the beginning of the second layer).

If you read below,
you will see that both the pressed DVD-discs are well within the
standards.

Download the
ECMA 267 Standard for
DVD-ROM, the ECMA 337 Standard for
DVD+R/RW and the
ECMA 338 Standard for
DVD-R/RW at http://www.ecma-international.org if you
want to look at the standards for yourself. Here is some data from the
ECMA standards (same for
DVD-ROM, DVD-R/RW and DVD+R/RW):

Random
errors:

A row of an
ECC Block that has at least 1 byte in error
constitutes a PI error. In any 8
consecutive ECC
Blocks the total number of PI errors before correction shall not exceed
280.

Here we see that a
PI error is defined as a row in an ECC block having 1 byte
or more containing errors and that the sum of PI errors in 8 ECC blocks after each
other should not exceed 280 PI errors.

But what is a row
and what is an ECC block? Again we
refer to the ECMA standards. We do
not copy and paste everything, but if you're interested, look in the
ECMA standards. A row is
182 bytes long where the last 10 bytes contain PI (Parity Inner)
information. An ECC block is 208 rows
long where the last 16 rows contain the PO (Parity Outer)
information. This gives us a maximum possible PI error amount of 208 errors per
block and for 8 blocks after each other this sum is of course 8 times higher,
giving a maximum possible amount of 1664 PI-8 errors. In practical use, a disc
with 1664 PI-8 errors is unreadable.

According to our
tests the specified max PI-8 sum of 280 for good discs seems to be a good
guideline, as some readers have problems reading discs when the PI-8 errors is
over 300 and most players starts to have problems when the PI-8 error level
reaches 600 or more.

But what are the
PIF errors that K-Probe
reports? They are Parity Inner Failures, meaning errors left after PI
correction. Only the ECMA 337 standard
describes the Parity Inner Failures. So how is a Parity Inner Failure defined?
Here is what the ECMA 337
states:

'If a row
of an ECC Block as defined in 13.3 contains more than
5 erroneous bytes, the row is said to be 'PI-uncorrectable"."

In theory, an
ECC block may in the worst case have 208 PIF since every ECC block is 208
rows long. But the ECMA 337 standard goes further and
specifies the max amount of accepted PI Failures (uncorrectable errors) allowed on a good disc:

'In any
ECC Block
the number of PI-uncorrectable rows
should not exceed 4."  

This means that when
the PIF sum is set to 1,
the maximum error value should not exceed 4. The theoretical maximum value for
PIF is 208
errors.

But what makes a
disc unreadable? A POF (Parity
Outer Failure) error will make the disc unreadable, but K-Probe
does not display the POF's.

Notice that there
are other aspects such as disc reflectivity, jitter, tracking errors and so on
that also will affect the readability of a DVD disc '“ but for this we do not
have measuring equipment available.

Also, another note
is that we have scanned the discs at 4X CLV speed,
by lowering the speed to 2X(DVD-R/RW)/2.4X(DVD+R/RW) or 1X
the amount of reported errors may drop on some discs. We scanned at 4X
CLV due to lower speeds
taking too much time.

To see if there is a
connection between the reported amount of errors and readability of the discs we
also include the reading curve from a NEC ND-4551A DVD-Writer. The reason why we
have changed the reader is that some companies disliked that we used a modified
firmware to obtain 16x reading speed. So to please them, we are now using a
drive that reads DVD+R/-R media
at 16x as default. A small speed reduction near the end
is still accepted on good discs, but serious reading problems or reading
failures is a bad sign.

 

Easier
explanation on how to read the test results:

Maybe this got too
technical, and you are wondering what to look for in KProbe
reports?

Use this as a
guideline for good discs:

• PI (Parity
  Inner): No larger areas
  on the disc should exceed 280 PI-8 errors, do not worry too much about high
  single spikes that exceed 280.
  
• PIF (Parity Inner
  Failures): No larger areas
  on the disc should exceed 4 PIF-1 errors, do not worry too much about high
  single spikes that exceed 4.

And as always; lower
is better

And look at the
reading curve; if it looks clean with no dips it should be good, a small
slowdown near the end is accepted.

 

DVD+R media compatibility and write quality:

In these tests
we will be using the Lite-On SHW-1635S and SHM-165P6S along with KProbe to
measure the disc quality. We will also be using the NEC ND-4551A with firmware
1-07 along with CD-Speed for our read-back tests.

Brand:	BenQ '“ Thanks to Daxon for sending us this media.
Manufacturer:	Daxon Inc.
Code:	DAXON AZ3
Disc Type:	DVD+R
Capacity:	4483MB
Certified Speed:	16x
Write Speed:	16x
Write Time:	6m:03s
PI-8 errors Average/Sec:	2.03
PI-1 failures (PIF) Avg/Sec:	0.05

Very good
result!

Brand:	BenQ '“ Thanks to Daxon Taiwan for sending us this media.
Manufacturer:	Daxon
Code:	Daxon AZ2
Disc Type:	DVD+R
Capacity:	4483MB
Certified Speed:	8x
Write Speed:	12x (Z-CLV)
Write Time:	7m:01s
PI-8 errors Average/Sec:	1.68
PI-1 failures (PIF) Avg/Sec:	0.28

The result is
good.

Brand:	Plextor '“ Thanks to Plextor for sending us this media.
Manufacturer:	Taiyo Yuden Company Limited
Code:	YUDEN 000 T03
Disc Type:	DVD+R
Capacity:	4483MB
Certified Speed:	16x
Write Speed:	16x
Write Time:	6m:11s
PI-8 errors Average/Sec:	4.73
PI-1 failures (PIF) Avg/Sec:	0.01

Plextor media
with Taiyo Yuden media code, the result is ok.

Brand:	Ricoh '“ Thanks to Ricoh Europe for sending us this media.
Manufacturer:	Ricoh Company Limited
Code:	RICOH JNP R02
Disc Type:	DVD+R
Capacity:	4483MB
Certified Speed:	1x-8x
Write Speed:	12x (Z-CLV)
Write Time:	7m:02s
PI-8 errors Average/Sec:	6.11
PI-1 failures (PIF) Avg/Sec:	0.00

8x certified
media burned at 12x, the result is good.

Brand:	Ricoh '“ Thanks to Ricoh Europe for sending us this media.
Manufacturer:	Ricoh Company Limited
Code:	RICOH JNP R03
Disc Type:	DVD+R
Capacity:	4483MB
Certified Speed:	1x-16x
Write Speed:	16x
Write Time:	6m:4s
PI-8 errors Average/Sec:	6.40
PI-1 failures (PIF) Avg/Sec:	0.03

The result is
good.

Brand:	RiDisc Xtreme '“ Thanks to E-net for sending us this media.
Manufacturer:	RiTEK Corporation
Code:	RITEK P16
Disc Type:	DVD+R
Capacity:	4483MB
Certified Speed:	16x
Write Speed:	16x
Write Time:	6m:13s
PI-8 errors Average/Sec:	2.56
PI-1 failures (PIF) Avg/Sec:	0.03

RiDisc Xtreme
with Ritek media code, the result is very good.

Brand:	TDK
Manufacturer:	TDK
Code:	TDK003
Disc Type:	DVD+R
Capacity:	4483MB
Certified Speed:	16x
Write Speed:	16x (CAV)
Write Time:	6m
PI-8 errors Average/Sec:	6.13
PI-1 failures (PIF) Avg/Sec:	0.07

The result is
good.

Brand:	Verbatim '“ Thanks to Verbatim for sending us this media.
Manufacturer:	Mitsubishi Chemicals Corporation
Code:	MCC 004
Disc Type:	DVD+R
Capacity:	4483MB
Certified Speed:	16x
Write Speed:	16x
Write Time:	6m:05s
PI-8 errors Average/Sec:	0.35
PI-1 failures (PIF) Avg/Sec:	0.01

A very high
quality burn from a good quality media.

 

DVD+ReWritable media:

Brand:	Ricoh '“ Thanks to Ricoh Europe for sending us this media.
Manufacturer:	RICOH Company Limited
Code:	RICOH JPNW21
Disc Type:	DVD+RW
Capacity:	4483MB
Certified Speed:	8x
Write Speed:	8x
Write Time:	7m:21s
PI-8 errors Average/Sec:	1.61
PI-1 failures (PIF) Avg/Sec:	0.05

The result is
excellent for this DVD+RW media.

The result is
ok.

To sum it
up: So
far the NEC ND-4551 writes DVD+R and DVD+RW media with good quality. Let's find
out how the drive will do on DVD-R/RW media.

 

On the next
page you will find the DVD-R/RW writing
results...

---

DVD-R media compatibility and write quality:

In these tests
we will be using the Lite-On SHW-1635S and SHM-165P6S along with KProbe to
measure the disc quality. We will also be using the NEC ND-4551A with firmware
1-07 along with CD-Speed for our read-back tests.

Brand:	BenQ '“ Thanks to Daxon for sending us this media.
Manufacturer:	Daxon Inc.
Code:	DAXON 016S
Disc Type:	DVD-R
Capacity:	4483MB
Certified Speed:	16x
Write Speed:	16x
Write Time:	6m:05s
PI-8 errors Average/Sec:	26.92
PI-1 failures (PIF) Avg/Sec:	0.07

The result is
OK.

Brand:	BenQ '“ Thanks to Daxon Taiwan for sending us this media.
Manufacturer:	Daxon
Code:	DAXON008S
Disc Type:	DVD-R
Capacity:	4483MB
Certified Speed:	8x
Write Speed:	8x (Z-CLV)
Write Time:	10m
PI-8 errors Average/Sec:	23.83
PI-1 failures (PIF) Avg/Sec:	0.06

The result is
good.

Brand:	Datasafe '“ Thanks to E-net for sending us this media.
Manufacturer:	Mitsubishi Chemical Corporation
Code:	MCC 03RG20
Disc Type:	DVD-R
Capacity:	4483MB
Certified Speed:	16x
Write Speed:	16x
Write Time:	6m:15s
PI-8 errors Average/Sec:	1.60
PI-1 failures (PIF) Avg/Sec:	0.01

Datasafe
media, with Mitsubishi media code and the results are very good.

Brand:	Ricoh '“ Thanks to Ricoh Europe for sending us this media.
Manufacturer:	CMC Magnetics
Code:	CMC MAG AM3
Disc Type:	DVD-R
Capacity:	4483MB
Certified Speed:	16x
Write Speed:	16x
Write Time:	6m:17s
PI-8 errors Average/Sec:	9.18
PI-1 failures (PIF) Avg/Sec:	0.11

The result is
ok.

Brand:	TDK
Manufacturer:	TDK
Code:	TTH02
Disc Type:	DVD-R
Capacity:	4483MB
Certified Speed:	16x
Write Speed:	16x (CAV)
Write Time:	6m:04s
PI-8 errors Average/Sec:	60.72
PI-1 failures (PIF) Avg/Sec:	0.08

The PI errors
are a bit high throughout the disc.

Brand:	Taiyo Yuden unbranded '“ Thanks to SVP (UK) for sending us this media.
Manufacturer:	Taiyo Yuden
Code:	TYG03
Disc Type:	DVD-R
Capacity:	4483MB
Certified Speed:	16x
Write Speed:	16x
Write Time:	6m:08s
PI-8 errors Average/Sec:	19.42
PI-1 failures (PIF) Avg/Sec:	0.01

The result is
ok.

 

DVD-ReWritable media:

Brand:	Traxdata - Thanks to Conrexx Europe for sending us this media.
Manufacturer:	RITEK
Code:	RITEK W06
Disc Type:	DVD-RW
Capacity:	4483MB
Certified Speed:	6x
Write Speed:	6x
Write Time:	10m:38s
PI-8 errors Average/Sec:	2.31
PI-1 failures (PIF) Avg/Sec:	0.09

Very good
results!

Brand:	Verbatim - Thanks to Verbatim (UK) for sending us this media.
Manufacturer:	Mitsubishi Kagaku Media
Code:	MKM 01RW 6X01
Disc Type:	DVD-RW
Capacity:	4483MB
Certified Speed:	6x
Write Speed:	6x
Write Time:	11m:14s
PI-8 errors Average/Sec:	15.39
PI-1 failures (PIF) Avg/Sec:	0.01

The results
are good.

To sum it
up:
Overall, the write quality is good on DVD-R and DVD-RW media.

 

Head on to
next page and read about DVD+R DL compatibility and write
quality...

---

DVD+R/-R Double Layer writing speed and
compatibility:

The NEC
ND-4551A supports the DVD+R DL/-R DL standard for writing Double Layer/Dual
Layer discs with a size around 8.5 GB at a writing speed of 8x/6x.

Testing
procedure:
We created an ISO Image from
a pre-authored DVD-Video compliant file set, with a total on-disc size of 8103
MB. We then wrote this image file using Nero Burning ROM 6. Below are the
results:

Verbatim media

Nero completed
the burn successfully with the Verbatim media in 18 minutes and 59 seconds.

Let us take a
look at the K-Probe result:

Brand:	Verbatim '“ Thanks to Verbatim (D) for providing the sample.
Manufacturer:	Mitsubishi Kagaku Media
Code:	MKM 001
Disc Type:	DVD+R DL
Capacity:	8103MB
Certified Speed:	2.4x
Write Speed:	8x
Write Time:	18m:59s
PI-8 errors Average/Sec:	13.50
PI-1 failures (PIF) Avg/Sec:	0.05

We can clearly
see that the PI-errors are higher on the first layer then the second
layer.

Let us compare
the NEC ND-4551A results with some other DL capable drives.

*1 Verbatim DVD+R DL
*2
Traxdata DVD+R DL
*3 Ricoh DVD+R DL
*4 DataWrite DVD+R DL

DVD-R
DL:

As mentioned
in the beginning of this page, the NEC ND-4551A supports the DVD-R DL standard
at 6x. Again, we used Nero Burning Rom 6 to write the DVD Image:

The NEC
ND-4551A used 21 minutes and 9 seconds to write the Verbatim DVD-R DL 4x media
at 6x.

Brand:	Verbatim '“ Thanks to Verbatim for providing the sample.
Manufacturer:	Mitsubishi Kagaku Media
Code:	MKM 01RD30
Disc Type:	DVD-R DL
Capacity:	8103MB
Certified Speed:	4x
Write Speed:	6x
Write Time:	21m:09s
PI-8 errors Average/Sec:	30.99
PI-1 failures (PIF) Avg/Sec:	0.13

Even though
the KProbe result showed high PI/PIF values, it did not affect the read back
curve.

 

Standalone DVD-Player compatibility:

We only have 4
standalone DVD-Players and 1 standalone DVD+R/W recorder available to test the
DVD+R DL media (BookType: DVD-ROM) and the DVD-R DL media (BookType: DVD-R)
with:

• Aiwa DVD
  Player XD-DV370
  
• Medion
  DVD/DivX Player MD7457
  
• Medion
  DVD/DivX/NeroDigital Player MD80796  
  
• Red Star
  DVD-Player 230G
  
• Mustek
  R100A DVD+R/W Recorder
  

Compatibility
results: 

All DVD
Standalone devices played the NEC ND-4551A burned DVD+R DL media. But only one
DVD Standalone devices would play the DVD-R DL media.

We would like
to mention, that the compatibility issue with standalone DVD Players/Recorders
and the DVD-R DL media format is caused by incompatibilities with the standalone
devices used in this review, and not the NEC ND-4551A or media format
used.

Summary: The writing quality
could need some improvements.

---

DVD-RAM:

The NEC
ND-4551A is a so-called Multi recorder, meaning is also supports the DVD-RAM
format.

This drive is
one of few drives that also support the DVD-RAM format, lets us look at the
recording side of the disc, and as you can see it got differences from the other
DVD+R/RW/R DL and DVD-R/RW/R DL discs.

You could see
a very fascinating pattern of darker spots, supposedly these spots are used for
calibration while writing and reading.

A DVD-RAM's
disc can be formatted in the following formats:

• FAT32
  
  
• UDF 1.02
  
  
• UDF 1.50
  
  
• UDF 2.00
  
  
• UDF 2.01
  
  
• UDF 2.50
  

By formatting
a DVD-RAM disc with FAT32 it will act like a removable hard drive and all
writing will be done in the 'background processes". Meaning you do not have to
wait for it to finish '“ you can start or work with other applications while the
DVD-RAM is working without noticing any 'hangs" or CPU slowdowns.

Lets us take a
look at the media we are going to use in these tests:

Panasonic branded DVD-RAM media
certified at 2-5x:

0000 - 16 0F 04 42 00 03 10 00 00 26 5F 5F 00 00 00 00 - ...B.....&__....
0010 - 80 20 00 10 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 22 00 00 00 00 - ..........."....
0020 - 10 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 - ................
01F0 - 00 00 00 00 52 0A 00 79 36 36 36 73 34 34 34 1A - ....R..y666s444.
0200 - 1A 00 00 11 22 81 85 88 88 00 85 88 88 01 84 87 - ...."...........
0210 - 87 01 84 87 87 0A 0C 0E 0E 0A 0C 0E 0E 09 0B 0D - ................
0220 - 0D 08 0B 0D 0D 4D 58 4C 31 36 0D 20 20 20 20 20 - .....MXL16......
0230 - 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 - ................
0240 - 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 - ................
0250 - 20 20 20 20 20 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 - ................
0260 - 00 00 00 00 00 01 01 79 04 70 36 36 36 79 80 80 - .......y.p666y..

0000 - 16 0F 04 42 00 03 10 00 00 26 5F 5F 00 00 00 00 - ...B.....&__....
0010 - 80 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 - ................
0020 - 10 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 - ................
01F0 - 00 00 00 00 52 0A 00 7B 34 34 34 77 2F 2F 2F 1A - ....R..{444w///.
0200 - 1A 00 00 11 22 05 02 00 00 05 02 00 00 06 03 01 - ...."...........
0210 - 00 06 04 02 01 0A 0B 0B 0C 0A 0B 0B 0C 09 0A 0B - ................
0220 - 0B 09 0A 0B 0B 52 49 54 45 4B 20 4D 30 32 00 00 - .....RITEK.M02..
0230 - 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 - ................
0240 - 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 - ................
0250 - 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 - ................
0260 - 00 00 00 00 00 01 01 82 00 74 33 33 82 7E 7F 00 - .........t33.~..

But now the
interesting part '“ writing and reading DVD-RAM media.

Panasonic DVD-RAM 5x without
verification

Panasonic DVD-RAM 5x with
verification

Traxdata DVD-RAM 3x without
verification

Traxdata DVD-RAM 3x with
verification

For those not
familiar with DVD-RAM, you might think that something went wrong during the
write process, when the verification option is turned on - since the
5x media was written at approximately 2.04x and the 3x media written at
approximately 1.28x. But do not worry - that is pretty normal for DVD-RAM discs,
the reason for the 'low" speed is '“ the drive constantly reads back the data
after writing it to verify that it's written correctly. We can also call it a
'bullet proof" writing/verify technique '“ with no data loss/errors.

Another
advantage with DVD-RAM is that the discs can be formatted/erased/written at over
100.000 times before it will/can cause/report any errors. Let's try to read back
the discs that we wrote:

Panasonic DVD-RAM 5x

Traxdata DVD-RAM
3x 

As we can see
from the pictures above, all media was read back at 5x using the CLV
technique.

To round off
this section we have included two quality scans:

Verbatim DVD-RAM 5x

Traxdata DVD-RAM
3x

---

Introduction:

The
following text is taken from a press-release:

19.
October 2005, Yamaha Corporation and Fuji Photo Film Co., Ltd. announced
the Labelflash™ technology, a new technology that advances the ability to
burn high quality images directly into a specialized dye layer on the disc
labeling side using laser for data recording. This technology allows consumers
to personalize and customize their DVDs with photos, text and graphics,
replacing traditional sticker and marker labeling.

Labelflash™
technology allows a consumer to burn pictures and/or write titles on the label
side of the DVD discs specially developed for the Labelflash™ system
with DVD writers with Labelflash™ function. There is no need for
printers and consumables for printing. To obtain high resolution and contrast
pictures in blue and silver color, a consumer only needs to turn the disc upside
down and insert it into the drive again after recording data. The unique
technology burns the image 0.6mm deep into the media in as little as five
minutes, creating a more stable and permanent image than traditional printable
media that uses the top layer of a disc for labeling. If this system is applied
to DVD set-top recorders, a consumer will also be able to burn program titles
and thumbnail images more easily.

The
technology marries the unique Yamaha DiscT@2 ('Tattoo") technology for picture
burning on CD-R data side with the advanced photochemical expertise of Fuji
Photo Film, which is a leading company in dye technologies for optical
media.

Fujifilm and
Yamaha are contacting many major DVD drive, DVD set-top recorder and DVD disc
manufactures to encourage them to adopt this system.

About
Labelflash(TH) Technology:

1. Customize the
   label side of your DVDs with the existing 'data recording
   laser."
   Labelflash™
   system burns pictures directly into a special layer added to the non-data, or
   label, side of a DVD disc and eliminates the need for special printers, labels
   or pens.
   
2. High quality
   images on the disc label side
   Labelflash™
   utilizes existing recording laser in standard DVD-writers to burn a high
   contrast and resolution image by changing the blue dye color to colorless.
   Consumer can choose picture-burning time from 5 min. to 20 min. in accordance
   with their quality needs.
   
3. Stable
   against vibration while burning pictures
   Labelflash™
   utilizes newly developed laser, pick up and rotation control, and high-speed
   signal processing system of image data. And newly developed Labelflash™
   DVD disc structure realizes the optimal focusing setting because the
   picture-burning layer at 0.6mm deep into the media is the same depth as the
   data recording layer on the data side.
   
4. Longlasting
   titles and pictures on DVDs
   
   
   
   • Images
     'burned" are more durable and stronger against scratches than those printed
     by printer and others because images are protected by the polycarbonate
     layer.
     
   • Labelflash™
     system can avoid troubles traditional sticker labeling may have, such as
     unstable rotation due to weight unbalance and damage to the drive by the
     possible peeling off of the sticker while operation.
     

Labelflash™
Specifications:

Around 1 month
later (November 2005) '“ NEC Germany released the following press
release:

NEC
launches the world's first DVD burners with Labelflash™ technology. The PC
drives will be available from December onwards. Labelflash™ burns custom motifs,
lettering or images onto the top side of DVD blanks. It puts very few
restrictions on creativity and design.

For the first time
NEC`s wide range of new drives will not only support DVD +R(W) and DVD-R(W) but
also DVD-RAM.

Labelflash™ '“ faster labelling of self-burned
DVDs

Innovative Labelflash™ technology simplifies the labelling of
self-burned DVDs '“ e.g. for archiving '“ and also enables creative DVD design. It
eliminates the need for complex adhesive labelling systems and considerably
enhances the durability of the media because, especially in the case of DVD
blanks, the paper label can make the medium unreadable.

Labelflash™
delivers high image quality because it enables 256 brightness shades. The
labelling process takes only around seven minutes to produce excellent quality
results. One special feature is that both the top side and the data side of the
blank can be labelled '“ provided that there is enough available memory.
Labelflash™ can be used for blanks with a writable Labelflash™ top surface. On
these media, the labelled top surface is covered by  0.6 millimetre-thick,
robust protect layer which ensures that even labels that are exposed to light
are extremely durable.

Multi drives with DVD-RAM '“ all formats in
one

For the first time NEC`s wide range of new drives will not only
support DVD +R(W) and DVD-R(W) but also DVD-RAM.

NEC's ND-4551A burner is
a genuine multitalent: DVD minus and DVD plus media are written at up to 16x DVD
speed, while rewritable (DVD +RW) and double-layer DVDs (DVD +R9) are written at
up to 8x DVD speed. DVD-RW and DVD-R DL are processed at 6x speed. 5x speed
applies for DVD-RAMs. As a read drive, the burner delivers 16x DVD, 5x DVD RAM
and 48x CD speed. NEC will also be marketing a lower cost model without
Labelflash™, the ND-4550A, which has the same write and read speeds as the
ND-4551A.

All trademarks
are the property of their respective holders.

 

The Media:

Now that you
have gotten an introduction and insight regarding Labelflash™ and the supported
drives, it is time to take a look at the Labelflash™ media.

The Jewel case (front)

The Jewel case (back)

The media itself (Printing
side)

Let us find
out who is the manufacturer on the data-side of this Fuji Labelflash™
media:

DVD Identifier
gave the following info:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Unique
Disc Identifier : [DVD-R :
RITEKF1]
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Disc
& Book Type :       [DVD-R] -
[DVD-R]
Manufacturer Name :      [Ritek
Corp.]
Manufacturer ID
:        [RITEKF1]
Blank Disc
Capacity :    [2,298,496 Sectors = 4.71 GB (4.38
GiB)]
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
**
INFO : Drive = _NEC DVD_RW ND-4551A [FW 1-07]
** INFO : Write Capabilities =
DVD+R DVD+R-DL DVD+RW
** INFO : Write Capabilities = DVD-R DVD-R-DL DVD-RW
DVD-RAM
** INFO : Disc = [DVD-R : RITEKF1]
** INFO : Reference Speed : 1x
DVD = 1385 kBps
** INFO : An Writeable Disc Is Recommended For Accurate
Results
** INFO : Write Speeds (Supported By This Drive On This Disc) Listed
Below

** INFO : GET PERFORMANCE Write Speed Descriptor(s)
Descriptor
#1 = 22160 kBps (16.00x) - [CLV/Non-Pure CAV]
Descriptor #2 = 16620 kBps
(12.00x) - [CLV/Non-Pure CAV]
Descriptor #3 = 11080 kBps ( 8.00x) -
[CLV/Non-Pure CAV]
Descriptor #4 =  8310 kBps ( 6.00x) -
[CLV/Non-Pure CAV]
Descriptor #5 =  5540 kBps ( 4.00x) -
[CLV/Non-Pure CAV]
Descriptor #6 =  2770 kBps ( 2.00x) -
[CLV/Non-Pure CAV]

** INFO : MODE SENSE Write Speed Descriptor(s) [Legacy
Command]
** WARNING : MODE SENSE Is Obsolete And Not Always Properly
Supported
Descriptor #1 =  8467 kBps ( 6.00x) - [CLV/Non-Pure
CAV]
Descriptor #2 =  7056 kBps ( 5.09x) - [CLV/Non-Pure
CAV]
Descriptor #3 =  5645 kBps ( 4.00x) - [CLV/Non-Pure
CAV]
Descriptor #4 =  4234 kBps ( 3.06x) - [CLV/Non-Pure
CAV]
Descriptor #5 =  2822 kBps ( 2.00x) - [CLV/Non-Pure
CAV]
Descriptor #6 =  1411 kBps ( 1.00x) - [CLV/Non-Pure
CAV]
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
**
INFO : Hex Dump Of 'Media Code'-Block Listed Below
** INFO : 4-Byte Header
Preceding 'Media Code'-Block Discarded
** INFO : Format 0Eh - Pre-Recorded
Information In Lead-In
0000 : 01 40 c1 fd 9e d8 52 00  02 87 0d 13
87 88 90 00   .@....R.........
0010 : 03 52 49 54 45 4b 46
00  04 31 00 00 00 00 00 00   .RITEKF..1......
0020 : 05
88 80 00 00 00 02 00  06 09 0f 15 87 88 90 00  
................
0030 : 07 a8 82 00 20 00 00 00  08 06 16 10 14 0f
0b 00   .... ...........
0040 : 09 94 07 0d 0b 88 88
00  0a 80 00 00 00 00 10 00   ................
0050 : 0b
09 1e 17 a7 89 85 00  0c b7 89 02 00 20 02 00  
............. ..
0060 : 0d 00 00 d0 00 00 00 00  0e 0c 2b 39 33 29
1c 00   ..........+93)..
0070 : 0f 50 1d 2b 0f 97 b5
00  10 88 80 00 00 00 00 00   .P.+............
0080 : 11
00 00 00 00 00 00 00  12 0c 32 45 41 2d 27 00  
..........2EA-'.
0090 : 13 50 23 2f 0f 97 b5 00  14 88 80 00 00 00
00 00   .P#/............
00a0 : 15 00 00 00 00 00 00
00  16 0a 4a 4f 4b 23 29 00   ..........JOK#).
00b0 : 17
80 1b 27 10 68 b5 00  18 88 88 00 08 00 08 00  
...'.h..........
00c0 : 19 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  1a 08 59 55 52 2d
2b 00   ..........YUR-+.
00d0 : 1b 60 1f 29 0b a9 b5
00  1c 88 80 00 00 00 00 00   .`.)............
00e0 : 1d
00 00 00 00 00 00
00                            ........        

**
INFO : Hex Dump Of 'Control Data Zone'-Block Listed Below
** INFO : 4-Byte
Header Preceding 'CDZ'-Block Discarded
** INFO : Format 10h - Physical Format
Information Of Control Data Zone
0000 : 25 0f 02 00 00 03 00 00  00
26 12 7f 00 00 00 00  
%........&......
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
[
DVD Identifier V4.2.0 - http://DVD.Identifier.CDfreaks.com
]
--------------------------------------------------------------------------

And with the
Disc Info option in Nero CD-DVD Speed:

As we can see
the media is manufactured by the Ritek Corporation and the media code is RITEK
F1.

 

Designing and writing Label (Label-side):

As mentioned
earlier, we will use Nero Burning ROM 6.6.1.3 to test the Labelflash™ technique
with, and so far the version number '6.6.1.3 NEC" is the only version capable of
supporting Labelflash™ for the time being.

Let us begin
with clicking the Labelflash™ icon on the Nero Burning ROM symbol
menu:

A new screen
will pop-up and we are ready to start our design:

We made a
quick and simple design, and selected Highest print quality, selectable modes
are: Fast, Medium, Highest and Custom.

Under the
custom mode you can adjust some settings of your own choice:

There are:
Contrast level (1-100) and the Rotation/Encoding Speed (Default, 7875 rpm, 4500
rpm and 2250 rpm).

Now that we
have looked at the custom settings, let us go back to the other settings, in
this case the Highest print quality option and hit burn.

At the point
where the progress bar reached 50% the remaining time suddenly showed 00:00 min.

As we can see
the total burning time and the 'guessed" time differ by only 25
seconds.

But let us
take a look at the finished result:

As the Label
(printing) side is very shiny, it was hard to make any good photos of the real
quality that is visible to the human eyes.

 

On the next
page we will make a label of the data
surface…..

---

Designing and writing Label (Data-side):

For the data
side tests, we will use an ordinary DVD-R media.

Label
only:

We will now
design our label for use on the data side of the disc. We will keep the design
simple since this is the data side of the disc.

As before, the
label editor opens with a blank label ready for us to add our own text and
graphics.

From the
screenshot above we can see we added some simple graphics and text to our
design.

For our first
test we selected the 'highest" quality setting, and then clicked on 'Burn" to
start the label burning process.

A warning then
popped up telling us if we proceeded we would not be able to burn any further
data to our disc.

With the
highest quality selected the burn process took 23 minutes and 52 seconds to
complete. Below we can see the resulting image:

Highest quality

To the naked
eye the result is excellent, and as we can see from our scanned image, both the
text and graphics are easy to read.

We then ran
the test again this time selecting 'medium" quality. The results can be found
below.

This time the burn process
completed in 16 minutes and 5 seconds.

Medium quality

Once again the
result is good. To the naked eye the disc has less contrast than the disc burned
at the 'highest" quality.

We once again
run the test, this time selecting the 'Fast" option.

As we can see
the burn process completed in 6 minutes and 10 seconds. But now let's take a
look at the result.

Fast

To the naked
eye and our scanned image, we can see the contrast and resulting quality is not
as good as the 'medium" or 'highest" quality settings, but as we can see, the
'Fast" option still produced a good result.

DATA and
label:

For this test
we combine both data and a label on the data side of the disc.

We first
burned 1.9 gigabyte of data to our DVD-R media using Nero Burning
Rom.

Once the data
burning had completed we opened our label editor once more.

Once we opened
our editor, we can see we have a blank label. This time however, we can see that
Nero has detected there is already data on the disc, and only the empty part is
available for writing our label.

We quickly
designed a simple text message for our test.

Now it was
time to burn our text message to our disc. We chose 'Highest"
quality.

Because the
area to be burned was much smaller this time, the burn process completed much
faster. And as we can see, the entire process completed in 7 minutes and 39
seconds. We can see the result below.

To the naked
eye the result is excellent, and from our scanned image we can see the text
message is clearly visible and easy to read.

Read back
test:

For a final
test on the data side of the disc, we decided to test if our combined data and
label disc could be read back on a non Labelflash™ drive.

For this test
we used the NEC ND-3540A drive and Nero CD-DVD Speed to read back our
disc.

As we can see,
the drive had no problem in reading back our combined data and label
disc.

EDITORS
NOTE: In Nero Burning ROM version 6.6.1.4 the label feature on the data-side is
now called DiscT@2™ (DiscTattoo) - see below:

 

Before we
round off this review, let us run the drive through some advanced tests at next
page…

---

To round off this review, we will
run some advanced tests on the NEC ND-4551A. These tests are: 'Sheep Test",
protected audio discs and some special disc tests.

The 'Sheep Test":

 For this test, we will use
the Sheep tests made by Alexander Noé. Why is it
called sheep test? That's because the logo of the first 1 to 1 copy program
called CloneCD is a sheep. When
looking at supported writers, you will notice that the feature list has sheep to
indicate if a feature is supported or not. In this case we are interested
in the writer's ability to backup/write weak sectors.
Also called: 'Correct EFM encoding of regular
bit-patterns".

• No sheep: Can't backup any
  Safedisc 2
  versions without the help of software tricks
  
  
• 1 Sheep:
  Can backup Safedisc 2 up to version 2.4x without software tricks
  
  
• 2 Sheep:
  Can backup Safedisc 2, including version
  2.5x
  
• 3 Sheep:
  Can write all possible weak sectors, few if any writers could do
  this.

One of our
forum moderators Womble, has written a guide concerning the
'Sheep Test" that can be found here.

In the
screenshot below taken from CloneCD, we see the NEC ND-4551A supports
everything.

The NEC
ND-4551A supports DAO-RAW recording mode, which basically means, it can write
uncorrected data and sub-channel data.

As we can see
from the table the NEC ND-4551A is a 'Two Sheep Burner", but it however failed
to write the Safedisc V2.90 and Sheep3 tests.

 

Copy protected Audio:

For our
protected audio test, we used the Exact Audio Copy program. We inserted the
protected audio discs and if the drive was able to recognize the disc we tried
to extract the music tracks to the hard drive. First let us look at the discs we
had available for this test: 

Celine Dion: A
New Day Has Come; protected with key2audio version 3.

 

Herbert
Gé¶nemeyer: Mensch - This disc is protected with Cactus Datashield 200.0.4
.3(build 12b)

And Michelle:
Leben!; protected with Cactus Datashield 200.5.1.91 '“ 5.10.090.

Results:

 

Overburning:

To test the
overburning capabilities of the NEC ND-4551A, we used the over-burning test in
Nero CD/DVD-Speed.

CD-R:

For this test
we used an Infiniti Professional Compax 99min/900mb CD-R. (Thanks to Medea
International (UK) for providing the disc).

According to
Nero CD/DVD speed the drive can overburn around 92 minutes.

To test if the
NEC ND-4551A is capable to read overburned CD-Rs, we used a 90:10 minutes
CD-R:

As we can see
for the picture above the NEC ND-4551A had no problems reading the 90:10 minutes
CD-R.

DVD+R/-R:

We also tried
to overburn DVD+R/-R media:

According to
Nero CD-DVD Speed this function is not supported on DVD+R/-R media by the NEC
ND-4551A.

 

This
concludes our NEC ND-4551A review, let us head on to the last page to read our
conclusion…

Positive:

• Supports DVD±R/+R DL/-R DL writing at 16x/8x/6x
• Supports CD-R/RW writing at 48x/32x
• Can write DVD±R/±R DL certified media at higher speed
• Good media support and compatibility on DVD±R
• Supports Bitsetting for DVD+R DL (sets auto. BookType to DVD-ROM)
• Supports disc quality scanning
• Supports LabelFlash™ and DiscT@2™ labelling techniques
• Can read DVD±R/RW at 16x/13x
• Reads DVD-Video SL/DVD-Video DL at 16x/12x
• Can copy/rip copy-protected Audio-CDs
• 'Two sheep" writer
• Supports DAO-RAW writing
• Can overburn CD-Rs (around 92 minutes)
• Very good user community support with several programs and modifications to get the most out of the drive
• Good retail and software package
• The hardware components are 'lead-free"

 

Negative:

• Does not support Mt. Rainier
• No support for DVD-R DL 4x media with RiTEK MID
• Reads CD-RW/CD-DA only at 40x
• No Bitsetting support (BookType - DVD-ROM) on DVD+R/RW media
• Green LED for both reading and writing

 

Conclusion:

Let us summarize the most important positive and negative points below:

The main positive points: The NEC ND-4551A being a so called 'Multi Recorder" and supports recording on currently available media formats (CD-R/RW, DVD+R/+RW/+R DL and DVD-R/-RW/-RAM/-R DL).

The NEC ND-4551A can write CD-R/RW media with excellent/very good quality, and can write those media types at high speed. DVD±R/RW writing quality is good with most media, and once again the NEC ND-4551A can burn the media fairly quickly.

DVD±R/RW media compatibility was also excellent with the NEC ND-4551A, with all our tested media burning at its rated, or faster than its rated speed.

DVD-RAM is well implemented on the NEC ND-4551A, Not only can the drive write at 5x using a fast CLV writing method, it can also read DVD-RAM media, regardless of the disc's rated speed at 5x, again using a fast CLV reading method.

The LabelFlash™ and DiscT@2™ labelling techniques allows the user to design labels and imprints on the label and data-side.

During our tests the NEC ND-4551A excelled at ripping audio CD's. The reading performance is excellent, and the DAE quality is also excellent, making the NEC ND-4551A an excellent choice for audio ripping.

The NEC ND-4551A also allowed selected DVD±R media to be burned at higher than its rated speed. This can save a lot of time during the burn process.

The supplied Nero Express software suite is also a very good, with a nice balance of features and ease of use.

This DVD writer is also one of those burners that has a very good user community support with several programs and modifications to get 'the most out of the drive". (Be aware, that most of these programs and modifications will VOID the drives warranty).

As a last point we would like to mention that this DVD burner are a 'lead-free" product, which will meets the recycling standards that came into effect on the 1st of January 2006.

The main negative points: There are not too many negative things to say about the NEC ND-4551A. But we did note a few things we would like to see improved.

Although writing quality with DVD±R media was overall good, the writing quality with some media could be improved.

DVD±R DL writing quality, although within specification could also be improved, as some of our tested media had fairly high PI/PIF errors. DVD-R DL media could also be improved. In our test the DVD-R DL manufactured by RITEK was not supported by the drive. This however, should be easy to correct with a firmware update.

We would also like to see Bitsetting for DVD+R/RW media, to set BookType to DVD-ROM, as this would help improve compatibility with older set top players.

We would also like to see a dual coloured LED, with one colour used for read and a different colour used for writing, instead of the present single coloured green LED.

To sum it all up, this is what we would say: 'The NEC ND-4551A is a well specified drive with good overall performance.  The LabelFlash™ feature will give the extra touch on your memorable and custom made DVD's".  However, there are areas where the drive could be improved.

 

By using our price grabber feature cdfreaks.pricegrabber we did not find any offers, but at getprice the drive is listed at 48,50 €. (March 2005).

 

You may comment on this review below or in this forum thread.

 

Thanks to:

---

 

	Bell Technology spol s.r.o. '“ Czech Republic for providing the media used in this review.
	Conrexx Technology B.V./RITEK Europe '“ The Netherlands for providing the media used in this review.
	Daxon Technology Inc '“ Taiwan for providing the BenQ media used in this article.
	E-Net Distribution '“ United Kingdom for providing the media used in this review.
	Medea International '“ United Kingdom for providing the media used in this review.
	MMORE International B.V. - The Netherlands for providing the media used in this review.
	Plextor SA/NV '“ Belgium for providing the media used is this article.
	Ricoh Europe '“ For providing the media used in this review.
	SVP Communication '“ The United Kingdom for providing the media used in this review.
	Verbatim - Germany and United Kingdom for providing the media used in this review.