| Preview: NEC ND-4570A |
We at CDFreaks would like to present a preview of the latest multi drive from NEC, the ND-4570A. The ND-4570A boasts several improvements over the ND-4550A. Among these improvements is a new faster 8x writing method for DVD±R, a new 6x CLV (Constant Linear Velocity) writing method for DVD-RW and 8x writing speed support for DVD-R DL media.
The NEC ND-4570A supports 48x/32x CD-R/RW, 16x DVD±R, 8x DVD+RW, 6x DVD-RW, 8x DVD±R DL writing technology, allowing Double/Dual Layer discs of 8.5Gb to be written. DVD-RAM at present is supported at up to 5X.
Drive specifications:
Below is the NEC ND-4570A specifications found on NEC (D) website
What's inside the box?
Since the drive is a bulk drive, there is neither a retail box nor any software, cables or fixing screws.
Now it's time to take a look at the drive itself.
The internal ND-4570A drive
Front
The bezel is NEC's usual plain but not unattractive style. The front sports a single (green) LED for read/write, an emergency eject hole and the eject/close button.
Top
On top of the drive we found one label, and we can see the drive was manufactured in Malaysia, during January 2006.
Bottom
Rear
On the back of the drive there are from the left: Digital Audio connector; analogue audio connector; pins and jumper to set the drive to cable select, slave or master; IDE connector, power connector.
What's new on the ND-4570A:
- The NEC ND-4570A has been completely redesigned and housed in a new case, which is approximately 2cm shorter than previous NEC drives.
- The drive mechanism has also been redesigned, and it appears an all new upper chassis has been used.
- An all new bezel has also been used; with the positions of the emergency eject hole and LED repositioned.
- A new tray design, now all trays are black regardless of the bezel colour.
Now, let us install the drive and check out the features on the next page…
Test machine:
For this preview we will be using a computer with the following configuration:
Hardware:
- Motherboard: ASUSTeK A8N-SLI DELUXE (nForce 4 SLI chipset)
- Processor: AMD Athlon 64 3500+ (Venice) 1000 MHz Hyper Transport
- RAM: 2 GB Corsair TWINX 2CL DDR
- GFX: Leadtek Winfast 6600 TD (PCI Express nVidia)
- Sound: SoundBlaster Audigy 2
- Hard disk: 1X 200GB Seagate Barracuda (SATA): 1X 120GB Maxtor (SATA)
System set-up:
The NEC ND-4570A was connected as Primary Master and identified itself as _NEC DVD_RW ND-4570A. DMA (Direct Memory Access) and auto-run was enabled for all devices.
Software:
Windows XP Professional x64 Edition is installed on the computer along with Service Pack 1. We will be using the following software in this preview:
Installation:
We quickly installed the drive without any problems and here is a screenshot from Nero info tool:
Our drive came shipped with firmware 1.02. The only drawbacks we could see are: the missing Mt Rainier support along with the small buffer size.
Features and techniques:
Now let us take a look at the internal layout of the NEC ND-4570A.
The drive is powered by NEC's latest chipset the D53645 AGM.
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.
Disc Quality Scanning:
The NEC ND-4570A supports 'Disc Quality Scanning" via Nero CD-DVD Speed, and in the above screenshot we can see a result produced by this feature.
Writing Technique:
CD-R/RW:
According to the NEC ND-4570A specifications, the drive should be able to write CD-R at a maximum speed of 48x and CD-RW and a maximum speed of 32x.
We used Nero CD-DVD Speed (create data disc) function to write a test CD-R/RW. Below are our results.
CD-R
As we can see from the above screenshot; the NEC ND-4570A uses CAV (Constant Angular Velocity) to write CD-R at its maximum speed of 48x. This resulted in an average write speed of 36.26x and a total write time of 3 minutes and 1 second.
CD-RW
The NEC ND-4570A uses Z-CLV (Zoned Constant Linear Velocity) to write CD-RW media at its maximum write speed of 32x. This resulted in an average write speed of 29.73x and a total write time of 3 minutes 32 seconds.
DVD±R/RW:
The specifications of the ND-4570A tell us it should be able to write DVD±R media at 16x, DVD+RW at 8x and DVD-RW at 6x.
We used Nero CD-DVD Speed (create data disc) function to write a test DVD±R/RW.Below are our results.
DVD+R
The NEC ND-4570A uses CAV (Constant Angular Velocity) to write DVD+R media at its maximum speed of 16x. This resulted in an average write speed of 11.75x and a total write time of 6 minutes and 8 seconds.
DVD+RW
The NEC ND-4570A uses Z-CLV (Zoned Constant Linear Velocity) to write DVD+RW media at its maximum speed of 8x. This resulted in an average write speed of 8x and a total write time of 7 minutes and 14 seconds.
DVD-R/RW:
DVD-R
The NEC ND-4570A uses CAV (Constant Angular Velocity) to write DVD-R media at its maximum speed of 16x. This resulted in an average write speed of 11.72x and a total write time of 6 minutes and 9 seconds.
DVD-RW
The NEC ND-4570A uses CLV (Constant Linear Velocity) to write DVD-RW media at its maximum speed of 6x. This resulted in an average write speed of 6.20x and a total write time of 10 minutes and 8 seconds.
DVD±R DL:
The specifications of the ND-4570A tell us it should be able to write DVD±R DL media at 8x.
We used Nero CD-DVD Speed (create data disc) function to write a test DVD±R DL media.Below are our results.
DVD+R DL
The NEC ND-4570A uses Z-CLV (Zoned Constant Linear Velocity) to write DVD+R DL media at its maximum speed of 8x. This resulted in an average write speed of 6.56x and a total write time of 18 minutes and 33 seconds.
DVD-R DL
The NEC ND-4570A uses Z-CLV (Zoned Constant Linear Velocity) to write DVD-R DL media at its maximum speed of 8x. Unfortunately we did not have any 8x compatible DVD-R DL media to test the drive at its maximum speed. We were able to write a test DVD-R DL at 6x. This resulted in an average write speed of 5.67x and a total write time of 20 minutes and 41 seconds.
DVD-RAM:
The specifications of the ND-4570A tell us it should be able to write DVD-RAM media at 5x. Below is our result.
DVD-RAM
The NEC ND-4570A uses CLV (Constant Linear Velocity) to write DVD-RAM media at its maximum speed of 5x (verify off). This resulted in an average write speed of 4.86x and a total write time of 11 minutes and 26 seconds.
Now let's head over to the next page where we will test the ND-4570A reading performance.
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.
Pressed
discs:
For this test
we used a pressed CD-ROM disc containing Roxio Media Creator 7.5 install CD that
is close to 75 minutes in length. Below you will see the produced
result.
CD-Recordable
Discs:
For this test
we made a copy of the original Roxio Media Creator 7.5 install CD. The disc we
used was a Ricoh 52X certified CD-R disc manufactured by CMC
Magnetics.
CD-Rewritable
discs:
Again, we made
a copy of the original Roxio Media Creator 7.5 install CD; this time we used a
Verbatim Ultra Speed (32X) CD-RW disc made by Mitsubishi Chemicals
Corporation.
The drive is
locked at 40x while reading CD-RW media.
Audio
CD:
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 79 minutes in length
(78:53:31).
Again we can
see that the read speed for CD Audio is locked at 40x.
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-Video:
For our DVD
reading performance tests we are going to start with a single and dual 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.
Pressed DVD-Video Single
Layer
Pressed DVD-Video Double
Layer
As we can see, the NEC
ND-4570A reads DVD-Video Single layer at 16x and DVD-Video Double Layer at 12x;
meaning no video RIPLOCK is in place.
DVD+R/RW:
For this test
we used one DVD+R and one DVD+RW with about 4,4Gb of data. Below are the
results.
DVD+R
DVD+RW
As we can see from the
results, the NEC ND-4570A reads a DVD+R at 16x and a DVD+RW at 13x.
DVD-R/RW:
For this test
we used one DVD-R disc and one DVD-RW disc filled with about 4,4Gb of data. Our
test results are found below.
DVD-R
DVD-RW
As we can see from the
results, the NEC ND-4570A reads a DVD-R at 16x and a DVD-RW at 13x.
DVD±R
DL:
DVD+R DL
DVD-R DL
The NEC ND-4570A reads
DVD±R DL media at a maximum speed of 8x.
DVD-RAM:
For this test
we used one DVD-RAM disc and the result can be found below.
As we can see
from the read test; the NEC ND-4570A reads DVD-RAM at
5x.
On the next
page: Writing performance…
CD-R writing performance:
The
specifications state that the drive should be able to write CD-R media at
48x.
The NEC ND-4570A used CAV
(Constant Angular
Velocity) to
write our BenQ CD-R media (manufactured by Daxon) at its maximum write speed of
48x. The average write speed was 36.26x with a total write time of 3 minutes 1
second. The result is excellent. (Thanks to Daxon for sending us this
media).
The ND-4570A used P-CAV
(Partial Constant Angular Velocity) to write our
Taiyo Yuden CD-R at 40x. This gives an average writing
speed of 31.24x and a writing time of 3 minutes and 24
seconds. The result is excellent. (Thanks to SVP for sending us this
media).
The NEC ND-4570A used
P-CAV (Partial Constant Angular Velocity) to write
our Infiniti CD-R (manufactured by SKC Co Ltd) at 32x. The average write speed
was 28.86x with a total write time of 3 minutes 34 seconds. The result is very
good. (Thanks to Medea International for sending us this media).
CD-RW writing performance:
The
specifications state that the drive should be able to write CD-RW media at
32x.
The NEC
ND-4570A uses Z-CLV, (Zone-Constant Linear
Velocity) to write CD-RW media at 32x.
The average speed was 29.73x and total writing time is 3 minutes and 32 seconds.
The result is good.
DVD+R writing performance:
The
specifications of this drive tell us that it should write DVD+R at 16x.
We used Nero CD-DVD Speed to
create a data disc with the ND-4570A, and then used the Lite-On SHW-16H5S along
with Nero CD-DVD Speed 'Disc Quality Check" to scan our discs.
The NEC
ND-4570A used CAV (Constant Angular Velocity) to write our
Verbatim DVD+R media (manufactured by Mitsubishi Chemicals) at 16x. The Average
write speed was 11.75x with a total write time of 6 minutes and 8 seconds. The
result is very good. (Thanks to Verbatim for sending this media).
The NEC
ND-4570A used CAV (Constant Angular Velocity) to write our
Verbatim DVD+R media (manufactured by Taiyo Yuden) at 16x. The Average write
speed was 11.68x with a total write time of 6 minutes and 24 seconds. The result
is excellent. (Thanks to SVP UK for sending this media).
The NEC
ND-4570A used Z-CLV (Zoned Constant Linear Velocity)
to write our Verbatim DVD+R media (manufactured by Mitsubishi Chemicals) at 8x.
The Average write speed was 7.91x with a total write time of 8 minutes and 12
seconds. The result is very good. (Thanks to SVP UK for sending this
media).
Reviewers note
The NEC ND-4570A now supports a faster
8x writing method. The burn now starts at 6x instead of 4x, this results in a
much faster write time.
DVD+RW writing performance:
The
specifications of this drive tell us that it should write DVD+RW at 8x.
We used Nero CD-DVD Speed to
create a data disc with the ND-4570A, and then used the Lite-On SHW-16H5S along
with Nero CD-DVD Speed 'Disc Quality Check" to scan our disc.
The NEC ND-4570A uses Z-CLV
(Zoned Constant Linear Velocity) to write DVD+RW
media at 8x. The average speed was 8.00x with a total write time of 7 minutes 14
seconds. The result is good. (Thanks to Ricoh Europe for sending this
media).
DVD-R writing performance:
The
specifications of this drive tell us that it should write DVD-R at 16x.
We used Nero CD-DVD Speed to
create a data disc with the ND-4570A, and then used the Lite-On SHW-16H5S along
with Nero CD-DVD Speed 'Disc Quality Check" to scan our discs.
The NEC ND4570A used CAV
(Constant Angular Velocity) to write our Taiyo Yuden DVD-R
at 16x. This gave an average writing speed of 11.72x, and a total writing time of 6 minutes and 9
seconds. The result is good. (Thanks to SVP
UK for sending us this media).
The NEC ND4570A used CAV
(Constant Angular Velocity) to write our TDK DVD-R at 16x. This gave an average writing speed of 11.69x, and a total writing time of 6 minutes and 11
seconds. PI errors are quite high, but the
result is good.
DVD-RW writing performance:
The
specifications of this drive tell us that it should write DVD-RW at 6x.
We used Nero CD-DVD Speed to
create a data disc with the ND-4570A, and then used the Lite-On SHW-16H5S along
with Nero CD-DVD Speed 'Disc Quality Check" to scan our disc.
The NEC
ND-4570A used CLV (Constant
Linear Velocity) to write our
DVD-RW at 6x. The average speed was 6.20x and the total writing time was 10
minutes and 8 seconds. The result is
excellent.
On the next
page we will look at DVD±R DL and DVD-RAM
writing performance….
DVD+R Double Layer writing
performance:
The
specifications of this drive tell us that it should write DVD+R DL at 8x.
We used Nero CD-DVD Speed to
create a data disc with the ND-4570A, and then used the Lite-On SHW-16H5S along
with Nero CD-DVD Speed 'Disc Quality Check" to scan our disc.
The NEC ND-4570A used Z-CLV, (Zone-Constant Linear
Velocity) to write DVD+R DL at 8x. This gives an average writing speed of 6.56x, and a writing time of 18 minutes and 33 seconds. The result
is good. (Thanks to SVP UK for sending us this media).
DVD-R Double Layer writing
performance:
The
specifications of this drive tell us that it should write DVD-R DL at 8x.
We used Nero CD-DVD Speed to
create a data disc with the ND-4570A, and then used the Lite-On SHW-16H5S along
with Nero CD-DVD Speed 'Disc Quality Check" to scan our disc.
The NEC ND-4570A used Z-CLV, (Zone-Constant Linear
Velocity) to write DVD-R DL at 6x. This gives an average writing speed of 5.67x, and a writing time of 20 minutes and 41 seconds. The result
is good. (Thanks to SVP UK for sending us this media).
DVD-RAM writing performance:
The
specifications of this drive tell us that it should write DVD-RAM at 5x.
We used Nero CD-DVD Speed to
create a data disc with the ND-4570A, and then used Nero CD-DVD Speed 'Scan
Disc" to scan our discs our disc for errors.
The NEC
ND-4570A used CLV (Constant
Linear Velocity) to write
DVD-RAM at 5x. The average write speed is 4.86x and total writing time is 11
minutes and 26 seconds.
This
concludes our preview of the NEC ND-4570A drive. Let us head on to the final
page for our 'preview" conclusion…..
Positive:
Supports DVD-RAM read and write 5x
Supports DVD±R at 16x
Supports DVD±R DL writing at 8x/8x
Supports DVD+RW/DVD-RW writing at 8x/6x
Supports
CD-R/RW writing at 48x/32x
Supports Bitsetting on DVD+R DL media (sets auto. BookType to DVD-ROM)
Reads DVD-Video SL/DL at 16x/12x
Very good
reading performance
Very good
write quality on our tested media
New 8x writing method on DVD±R speeds up the burning process.
Negative:
- Does not support Mt. Rainier.
- Reads CD-DA/CD-RW only at 40x.
- Does not support Bitsetting on DVD+R/+RW.
- Green LED for both reading and writing.
- Some CD-R media rated at 48x/52x only writes at 32x/40x.
Conclusion:
To sum it all up, this is what we would say: Although the NEC ND-4570A is a very new drive and no firmware updates are yet available, this drive performs extremely well. Reading performance is excellent and writing performance on the tested media was very good.
We should however wait for a full CD Freaks review of the retail drive before coming to any premature conclusions.
By using our price grabber feature cdfreaks.pricegrabber we could not find a price listing for the drive.
You may discuss/comment on this preview below, or in this forum thread.
Thanks to:
SVP Communication '“ United Kingdom for providing the media used in this preview.
Verbatim - Germany and United Kingdom for providing the media used in this preview.
Medea International '“ United Kingdom for providing the media used in this preview.
Ricoh Europe '“ for providing the media used in this preview.
Daxon (Taiwan) for providing the Daxon media used in this preview.
