Review: Plextor PX-B310U Reviewed by: Vroom Provided by: Plextor Europe Firmware: 1.07 Manufactured: April 2010

Plextor was kind enough to send us the
PX-B310U external Blu-Ray combo drive for a review. The Drive supports 6x
reading on SL blu-ray, and it supports writing and reading of DVD±R/RW, DVD-RAM
and CD-RW media.

Drive
Specifications

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Here are the specifications off the
PX-B310U that we found on the Plextor site.

Packaging

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Let’s take a look at the packaging.

Front
side.

Back
side.

Top side.

Both
rear sides.

What’s
inside the box

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Now it’s time to take a look at the drive
itself and what the drive came shipped with.

Our retail package contained the PX-B310U
drive, the power supply unit, instructions manual, USB cable, a cleaning cloth
and two software cd’s and also a base to allow vertical mount of the drive.

Now let’s take a closer look at the drive.

A
general view of the drive.

The
front side of the drive is very stylish, as we can see it has the Blu-RayDisc
logo, also the dvd and cd logos, it has an emergency eject hole, and the eject
button, and a sliver line in the middle.

Drive
top.

Drive
bottom

The
label indicates that the drive was manufactured in April 2010 in China.

On
the rear side we have the USB connector and the DC IN connector, and the on off
switch.

Now let’s head on to the next page were
we can take a look at the features of the drive….

Test
machine

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

Hardware:

• Toshiba A300-1MT
• Processor: Intel Pentium T3200 @
  2Ghz
• RAM: 3
  GB DDR2 PC2-6400
• GFX: ATI
  Mobility Radeon HD 3470
• Sound:
  Onboard Realtek
• Hard disk: Western Digital Scorpio Black 320Gb
• Hard disk storage: 500GB Seagate Barracuda LP (SATA 2 5900rpm  connected via
  eSATA).
• Display:
  15.4
• Operating System: Windows 7 Home Premium (32 bit)

System
setup:

The Plextor PX-B310U was connected to one
of the main-board's USB ports and reports as a PLEXTOR BD-R PX-B310U USB Device.

From the screenshot from Nero InfoTool
above, we can see the Plextor PX-B310U supports BD-R, BD-R DL, BD-RE, BD-RE DL
and BD-ROM reading. The drive came shipped with firmware version 1.07 and no
updates were available at the time of writing this review.

Installed
software:

• Nero Multimedia Suite
  10
• Nero disc
  speed
• Nero Info
  Tool
• DVDFab 7
• Opti Drive
  Control
• Exact Audio
  Copy

 

Features
and techniques

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Software Bundle:

Now let’s take a brief look at the supplied
software bundle. Please note that we may not use any of this software in this
review.

The first disc of the Plextor PX-B310U is
the PlexUTILITIES Ver. 1.2.6. and we will take a closer look at that later.

The second disc that the Plextor PX-B310U
is supplied with CyberLink’s BD Suite and includes the following applications.

• Power Producer
• Power Director
• Power DVD
• Instant Burn
• Power2Go
• BD Advisor
• Power Backup
• Label Print

The
first screen of the Plextor BD Suite cd.

Software
install screen

BD
Advisor

BD Advisor reports that everything is in
order for Blu ray playback.

BookType
(BitSetting):

The Plextor PX-B310U can manually only, set
the BitSetting, and is capable of writing DVD+R/RW and +R DL media with DVD-ROM
book type.

Here is how you could check if your discs
are really written with DVD-ROM book type:

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

DVD+R
DL with book type DVD-ROM

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

Writing technique

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Now it’s time to take a closer look at the
write technology used by the Plextor PX-B310U.

For these tests we used Nero Disc Speed and
Opti Drive Control, and wrote a full disc at the drive’s maximum speed.

CD Recordable:

According to the specifications of the Plextor
PX-B310U, it should be able to write CD-R media at a maximum speed of 48x.

The Plextor PX-B310U uses CAV, (Constant
Angular Velocity), to write at its maximum speed of 48X. This
gives an average speed of 35.58x and a total writing time of 2 minutes and 40
seconds.

For comparison we have made the following
table: 

As we can see, the Plextor PX-B310U is the fastest
drive when writing CD-R media.

CD Re-writable:

According to the specifications of the
Plextor PX-B310U, it should be able to write CD-RW media at a maximum speed of
24x.

The Plextor PX-B310U uses Z-CLV, (Zoned
Constant Linear Velocity), to write at its maximum speed
of 24X. This gives an average speed of 21.53x and a total writing time of 4
minutes and 3 seconds.

For comparison we have made the following
table: 

As we can see, the Plextor PX-B310U was
about average when compared to our other drives when writing CD-RW media.

16x DVD+R writing speed:

According to the specifications of the
Plextor PX-B310U, it should be able to write DVD+R/-R media at a maximum speed
of 16x.

DVD+R

The Plextor PX-B310U uses CAV, (Constant
Angular Velocity) to write at its maximum speed of 16X but the
USB interface was slowing the drive to 14x. This gives an average speed of 11.01x
and a total writing time of 5 minutes and 32 seconds.

16x DVD-R writing speed:

DVD-R

The Plextor PX-B310U uses CAV, (Constant
Angular Velocity) to write at its maximum speed of 16X and again
the USB interface slows the drive to 14x. This gives an average speed of 11.00x
and a total writing time of 5 minutes and 49 seconds.

For comparison we have made the following
table: 

Even with the USB interface the PX-B310U is
above average when writing DVD±R media.

8X DVD+RW writing speed:

According to the specifications of the
Plextor PX-B310U, it should be able to write DVD+RW at a maximum speed of 8x.

The Plextor PX-B310U uses Z-CLV, (Zoned
Constant Linear Velocity), to write at its maximum speed
of 8X. This gives an average speed of 7.41x and a total writing time of 7
minutes and 45 seconds.

For comparison we have made the following
table: 

The Plextor PX-B310U was about average
regarding speed when writing our test DVD+RW media.

6x DVD-RW writing speed:

According to the specifications of the
Plextor PX-B310U, it should be able to write DVD-RW at a maximum speed of 6x.

The Plextor PX-B9310U uses Z-CLV, (Zoned
Constant Linear Velocity), to write at its maximum speed
of 6X. This gives an average speed of 5.76x and a total writing time of 10
minutes and 37 seconds.

For comparison we have made the following
table: 

The Plextor PX-B310U was one of the slowest
drives when writing DVD-RW media.

8x DVD+R DL writing speed:

According to the specifications of the
Plextor PX-B310U, it should be able to write DVD+R DL at a maximum speed of 8x.

The Plextor PX-B310U uses Z-CLV, (Zoned
Constant Linear Velocity), to write at its maximum speed
of 8X. This gives an average speed of 6.37x and a total writing time of 16
minutes and 59 seconds.

8x DVD-R DL writing speed:

According to the specifications of the
Plextor PX-B310U, it should be able to write DVD-R DL at a maximum speed of 8x,
unfortunately the media we had was 4x only.

The Plextor PX-B310U uses CLV, (Constant
Linear Velocity), to write at its maximum speed of 4X, our write was
completed in 27 minutes and 07 seconds.

For comparison we have made the following
table: 

The Plextor PX-B310U was a fast drive when
writing DVD+R DL media

Summary:

The Plextor PX-B310U is good performer
across all media groups, returning some fast burns.

Let’s head on to the next page where we
will check reading performance….

Reading performance

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For these tests we will use Nero
CD/DVD-Speed and Opti Drive Control to read various BD’s, CD’s and DVD’s,
including audio discs and DVD-media.

CD reading performance:

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CD-ROM:

For this test we used a pressed CD-ROM, the
CD is close to 75 minutes in length. Below you will see the produced result:

The Plextor PX-B310U reached 47.14x read
speed. Let’s compare it with some other drives below.

The Plextor PX-B9310U was one of the
fastest drives when reading our test CD-ROM

CD Recordable discs:

For this test we made a copy of the CD. The
disc we used was a JVC 52X certified CD-R disc manufactured by Tayio Yueden.

The Plextor PX-B310U reached 47.71x read
speed. Let’s compare it with some other drives below.

The Plextor PX-B310U was again one of the
fastest drives we tested when reading our test CD-R

CD Re-writable discs:

Again, we made a copy of the CD, this time
we used a Verbatim Ultra Speed (24X) CD-RW disc made by Mitsubishi Chemicals
Corporation.

The Plextor PX-B310U reached 40.25x read
speed. Let’s compare it with some other drives below.

The Plextor PX-B310U was one fastest drive when
reading our test CD-RW.

Audio – Digital Audio Extraction:

To test the digital audio extraction
performance of the Plextor PX-B310U, again 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 nearly 79 minutes in length (78:56:45).

The Plextor PX-B310U reached 18.05x when
reading our test audio disc. Let’s compare it with some drives below.

The Plextor PX-B310U was gave a poor
results when reading our test CD-Audio disc.

DVD reading performance:

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

Pressed DVD Video:

For our DVD reading performance tests we
are going to start with single and Double Layer 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 OTP)

The Plextor PX-B310U is not riplocked and
is able to read our single layer disc at 16x and our double layer test discs at
12x

We present the table below for comparison
with other Blu-ray drives.

The Plextor PX-B310U was one of the fastest
drives when reading pressed DVD-Video discs.

DVD – DVD+R/RW:

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

DVD+R

DVD+RW

We present the table below for comparison
with other Blu-ray drives.

The Plextor PX-B310U was above average when
reading DVD+RW and DVD+R.              

DVD – DVD-R/RW:

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For this test we used a Maxell 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.

We present the table below for comparison
with other Blu-ray drives.

The Plextor PX-B310U was again above
average when reading DVD-R and DVD-RW.

DVD±R DL discs:

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DVD+R DL:

The Plextor PX-B310U read our DVD+R DL test
disc at 8x reading speed.

DVD-R DL:

The Plextor PX-B310U read our DVD-R DL test
disc at 8x reading speed.

We present the table below for comparison
with other Blu-ray drives.

The Plextor PX-B310U was the slowest drive
we have tested when reading our test DVD±DL media.

Blu-ray reading performance:

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BD-ROM SL

We selected a BD-ROM SL disc containing a
movie, Underworld.

The Plextor PX-B310U read our BD-ROM DL
media at 6x reading speed.

BD-ROM DL:

We selected a BD-ROM DL disc containing the
movie, Quantum of solace.

The Plextor PX-B310U read our DL BD-ROM
media at 4x reading speed.

BD-R:

The Plextor PX-B310U read our BD-R disc at 6x
reading speed.

BD-RE:

The Plextor PX-B310U read our BD-RE at 6x
reading speed.

Summary:

The Plextor PX-B310U is a fast reader of BD
media, it could reach 6x on single layer media BD-ROM/-R/-RE and 4x on Dual
Layer BD media, and all this from the USB port.

Now let’s head over to the next page
where we will test CD-R/RW writing performance……

The specifications of the Plextor PX-B310U
state that the drive is able to write CD-R/RW discs at 48x/24x. Let us find out
how the drive really performs in speed and quality.

Writing Data CD-R discs:

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For our data writing tests, we simply
burned a full disc using CD-Speed (create data disc) function and burned the
discs at the maximum speed allowed.

Write quality:

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We will test CD-R discs from many different
CD-R manufacturers. To really measure the write speed, we used the “create data
CD” function in Nero Disc Speed. The discs were written at the maximum speed
that the drive supports. For the quality test, we used nero disc speed, Disc
Quality Scan and combined this with a Transfer Rate
Test to test if the resulting disc was readable. Also note that
different drives and different reading speeds may affect the results obtained
when scanning the discs. We used an Optiarc AD-7240S with 1.04 firmware and
scanned the discs at 48X speed.

There is more than one way to handle C1
and C2 error detection/correction, but a simple and common way is to detect and
correct up to two errors per frame in each stage and detect three or more
errors:

• E11: 1 error
  detected and corrected by C1 layer
• E21: 2 errors
  detected and corrected by C1 layer
• E31: 3 or more
  errors detected but not corrected by C1 layer

The sum of these (per second) is called
the Block Error Rate: BLER=E11+E21+E31

• E32: 3 or more
  errors detected but not corrected by C2 layer

Any E31 is un-correctable by the C1 layer
and will result in the bytes in that frame being redistributed into multiple
frames which are passed to the C2 layer.

Any E32 is un-correctable by the C2 layer
and will result in interpolation being used for Audio CDs or will result in
third layer error correction being used for Data CDs.

Different drives have different ways of
reporting these errors in a Disc Quality scan.  Lite-On CD-RW drives
will report C1 and C2 errors this way:

• C1=BLER=E11+E21+E31
• C2=E32

Here is an easier way to look at Disc
Quality Scanning:

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.

In short, our analysis will be based on
this guideline to determine the quality of the burned disc:

CD-R/RW
quality scans guideline

Below are the obtained results:

A good result to start our CD-R tests.

The result is again good.

The result is OK but we expected better
from this media.

The result is again OK.

The result is bad with a lot of C2 errors.

Writing Quality with Re-Writable discs:

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The result is very good for rewritable
media.

Summary:

Both CD-R and CD-RW writing quality with
the Plextor PX-B310U is generally good.

Now let’s head on to the next page where
we will test DVD recordable performance….

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.

Write quality:

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Disc Quality
Scanning - PI/PO:

DVDs use an error detection and correction
system (ECC) which is usually transparent to the end-user, but we can get an
idea of the "quality" of a disc by performing Disc Quality Scanning,
which shows how many errors the drive is detecting and correcting behind the
scenes.

There are two layers or stages of error
detection and correction on all DVD media; these are called Parity Inner (PI)
and Parity Outer (PO). Data is arranged in ECC blocks containing rows and
columns of user data with additional columns of PI error correction and rows of
PO error correction.

An ECC block contains 32 KByte of user data
with some added control data, scrambled and arranged in 192 rows and 172 columns
with an additional 10 columns of PI error correction and 16 rows of PO error
correction.

The Parity Inner stage is performed first,
and up to 5 bytes in a row can be corrected. Any row with one or more errors is
counted as a Parity Inner Error (PIE). Any row with more than 5 errors is
considered un-correctable and is counted as a Parity Inner Failure (PIF).

The Parity Outer stage is performed next
and will detect and attempt to correct any errors that are still left after the
PI stage. Any column that has errors is counted as a Parity Outer Error (POE),
and any column that has un-correctable errors is counted as a Parity Outer
Failure (POF). If a POF occurs the drive can sometimes re-read the problematic
spot and correct the problem; this happens only during normal reading and not
during scanning, however.

Disc Quality scanning is influenced by the
drive performing the test, and that's why different drives report different
results and even the same drive will report (slightly) different results when
scanning the same disc again. Please note that PI/PO and Jitter scans only test
some aspects of disc quality and that other important aspects are not revealed.

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

The scan above shows the results from a
pressed, Single Layer DVD-Video disc (Golden eye).

The above scan shows the result from a
pressed Double Layer DVD-Video disc (The Green Mile).

The Lite-On DVD burners used in this
review report errors as follows:

·        
PIE per 8 ECC blocks (rows with 1 or more bytes
in error)

·        
PIF per 1 ECC block (rows with 6 or more bytes
in error)

We want to see as low error numbers as
possible.
PIE per 8 ECC blocks should be no higher than 280.
PIF per 1 ECC block should be no higher than 4.

Both the pressed DVD-discs above are well
within the standards if we ignore the single PIF spike in the DL scan.

If you want to look at the standards for
yourself, 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.

Notice that there are other aspects such as disc
reflectivity, 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 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 an Optiarc AD-7200A DVD-Writer which by default is able to
read DVD±R media at 16x speed. A small speed reduction near the end is still
accepted on good discs, but serious reading problems or reading failures is a
bad sign.

Jitter:

Jitter
is a very complex subject and even more difficult to explain when we start to
use optical drives designed for the home market to measure jitter values.

Let’s
first look at the DVD specification for pressed DVD discs (in the bold part courtesy
of Pioneer Electronics).

“The
DVD design target is that when the worst-case disc allowed by the
specification, considering the economics of production, is played using the worst-case
pickup that can be produced in volume economically, the byte error rate after
error correction will still be 1 x 10-^-20, which is good enough to
be acceptable for computer applications.

Since
the above target is for "after error correction," the error
correction capability must be calculated. Considering the trade-off between
error correction capability and the overhead of the added redundancy, the DVD
format was set to one ECC block per 32 KB. This requires a byte error rate
before correction of 1 x 10^-2.
In order to achieve good economy on both the part of the discs and the playback
mechanisms. The current disc tilt specification was determined as a result of
the efforts on both sides.

As
will be explained hereafter, it is difficult to make the error rate a
specification of the disc itself. Therefore, a jitter standard is set by the
DVD specifications. A simple calculation based on a normal distribution
requires that the jitter rate be under 15.4%, and experimental results indicate
that jitter must be under 16%, to achieve the required error rate. Since the
disc tilt varies within a revolution, it was decided to adopt the design
concept that jitter must remain within 16% at the instantaneous peak value of
tilt. Since it is actually very difficult to measure the peak value, the
concept became to measure the average jitter at under 15%, and the byte error
rate at under 5 x 10-3.”

What
is Jitter?

In basic terms, we could say jitter is a
product of “pit and land distortion” In other words, when the drive reading the
disc has to compensate by means of a “tilt servo” which constantly tries to
move and refocus the PUH lens for optimum tracking and tries to compensate for
the imperfections of pits and lands on the pressed or recordable media. This is
further compounded by the hardware used for recording and playback. Not only is the record and replay process limited by the resolution
of the optical pickup, it is also horribly non-linear. In addition, the
playback of the pits is subject to non-linear crosstalk from nearby pits in the
same track, and also from pits in nearby tracks.

The things that causes jitter divide into three main
types.

• Variation in pit length
  and width.
• Crosstalk from nearby pits
  in the same track.
• Crosstalk from pits in
  adjacent tracks.

 

Variation in pit length and width.

The recorded pits themselves are not perfectly
accurate. Anything which causes variations in the sizes of the pits will
produce jitter. A prime culprit of this is sudden variations in laser power
(laser noise). If laser power varies, then the laser beam itself changes and
will vary in intensity and possibly focus. This will cause the pit length and
width to also vary and we now have jitter.

Crosstalk from nearby pits in the same track.

If the pits are not totally accurate, then the laser
beam spot may overrun a pit and gather data from the adjacent pit in the same
track, or if the “land” is to short, then the laser beam spot can be influenced
by the adjacent pit and this is called inter-symbol interference. Inter-symbol interference
is worse at low recording velocities, because the pits are shorter and closer
together. And it is the cause of "deviation" of the pit lengths.

Crosstalk from pits in adjacent tracks.

Crosstalk between pits in adjacent tracks is caused by
the laser beam spot being larger than the width of the track. It is a largely
random contribution and is worse at lower recorded velocities, because the
highest frequency components of the readout signal in the wanted track, with
which the crosstalk is competing, are weaker.

Some
other factors to consider

There
are many aspects to consider when we add Recordable DVD media into the mix. We
are now dealing with an organic dye, which is inherently unstable. We must also
consider the equipment we are using to measure jitter is aimed at the home
market. So we must also take into account variations between drives that we are
unable to calibrate for such tests.

Now
let’s look at some of the hardware limitations of the drives we are using to
measure jitter.

If
there is no tilt, then the jitter value includes components from light source
noise, circuit noise, disc noise, standard interference between symbols (inter
-symbol interference), and some small amount of crosstalk from the neighbouring
tracks.

Next
we consider manufacturing variation in the circuitry.
Variation due to the circuitry have noise-like characteristics, and increase
the minimum jitter level, but are thought to have a very small effect on tilt
margin. Factors such as offset in the servo circuit, however, both increase the
jitter level and decrease tilt margin.

How
we will measure jitter.

We
will be using a Lite-On DVD writer to conduct these tests along with Nero
DiscSpeed and Opti Drive Control at 4x scanning speed. In the screen
shot below we can see a PI/PIF scan including a jitter test (the purple graph
in the lower window) we carried out on a single layer DVD+R media.

Now,
let's find a reasonable average jitter level. Experimental results indicate
that 8% average value or less is a desirable figure, based on the DVD
specification. That does not mean that jitter average values above 8% are bad.
In fact, many optical drives will quite happily read recordable DVD media with
jitter values of more than 14% average without any problems. Other drives, including
standalone DVD players may begin to struggle reading discs with average jitter
values above 10%. So there is a fairly wide range of acceptable values. One
must test their own playback devices to see what they can cope with.

However,
for the purpose of having a basic guideline we can use in our reviews, we
present a rating system for average jitter values.

·        
Less than 8% (average) = Very good

·        
8% - 9% (average) = good

·        
9% - 12% (average) = average

·        
Above 12% (average) = poor

Here is an easier explanation on how to read the test
results

Maybe this got too technical, and you are
wondering what to look for in your Opti Drive Control Quality Scans?

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.

·        
Jitter: An average jitter value of 8% or less is
considered very good. You should not worry too much if the average value is
slightly above this figure.

And as always; lower is better

DVD+R media compatibility and write
quality:

DVD+R media compatibility and write quality:

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In these tests we will be using a Lite-On
DH20A3P with firmware XV6D along with Nero DiscSpeed to measure the disc
quality. We will also be using the Optiarc AD-7240S with firmware 1.04 along
with Nero DiscSpeed for our read-back tests.

A bad result, we didn’t expect from this
media.

The result is very good and again jitter is
within limits.

A good result, from this 8x media
manufactured by Taiyo Yuden.

A good result again, for this TDK media.
Jitter average is also very good at 8.94%.

The result is poor, and the jitter level is
also high.

A fair result. But at the beginning we have
high levels of Jitter, and also PIF is high at the start and the end of the
disc. We didn’t have any problems when performing a Transfer rate test.

DVD+RW media compatibility and write quality:

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We used the same test procedures as in our
DVD+R tests.

Below are our obtained results.

Considering this a re-writable disc, the
result is excellent.

Summary:

The Plextor PX-B310U writes DVD+R with
mostly good writing quality, but we have to say we didn’t expect the verbatim
results to be that bad.

On our tested DVD+RW media, writing quality
was excellent.

Now let’s look at DVD-R/RW performance
and quality on the next page….

DVD-R media compatibility and write quality:

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In these tests we will be using a Lite-On DH20A3P
with firmware XV6D along with Nero Disc Speed to measure the disc quality. We
will also be using the Optiarc AD-7240S with firmware 1.04 along with Nero Disc
Speed for our read-back tests.

The result is good, although PIE and Jitter
levels are high at the end of the disc, but the disc read back was perfect.

The result is again disappointing, PIF are
very high, and also jitter. The read back of the disc failed.

The result is poor, PIF & PIE levels
are high at the end of the disc, and also read back wasn’t perfect.

The result is excellent.

This burn is poor PIE errors are high at
the end of the disc.

DVD-RW media compatibility and write quality:

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For this test we used the same testing
procedures as in our DVD-R tests.

Considering this a re-writable disc, the
result is once again excellent and the rise of the PIE didn’t have any effect
on the Transfer Rate Test.

Summary:

The DVD-R writing quality was poor. We hope
that firmware will fix this. Also we are disappointed again, from the fact that
the drive failed to burn our verbatim media.

On our tested DVD-RW media, writing quality
was excellent.

Let’s head on to the next page where we
will test DVD R DL writing performance and quality……

DVD+R/-R Double Layer writing performance and quality:

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The Plextor PX-B310U 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.

DVD+R DL:

For these tests we used Opti Drive Control
to burn our test disc. We then used a Lite-On DH20A3P along with Opti Drive
Control to test the disc’s quality; we then finally ran a read-back test on our
Optiarc AD-7240S.

The result is good, jitter is within limits
but there is room for improvement.

DVD-R DL:

The result is excellent for this media and
Jitter levels are low.

Summary:

The Plextor PX-B310U writing quality on our
tested DVD±R DL media was generally very good.

Now let’s take a look at the
PlexUTILITIES …

PlexUtities

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Installing the PlexUTILITIES was very easy,
just following the instructions on the installer.

The
first screen

And
the last screen of the install.

Now let’s take a look at the software, and
what it can offer.

The main screen of the program has all the
functions of the software in the left side and places the information (or the
test results and settings) in the right side. We want say much about the Basic
information section of the PlexUTILITIES

The
software offer information on the drive, the disc that is in the drive and a system
info.

The Additional information has again three
main options, the Engineering information, the IOP and the Transfer
rate test. Now we will take a closer look to the IOP section of the
software.

The IOP section can provide some useful  info on how the laser has decayed
over time.

The Additional Control menu has six
options, starting with Self Test, PlexErase,
Power Condition Settings, Bit Setting, Power Tune
and PlexSpeed. We will only mention Self
Test, Power Condition Settings, and PlexSpeed.

As
we can see the drive can perform a self test and report back if everything is
working as expected.

Here
we can select the change the running time for entering IDLE or STANDBY status
of the drive.

Here
as we can see we can change the reading speed of the drive.

Here is one of the features of this suite
that will be appreciated from most of the users. The Disc Quality sections
offer four tests starting with Bler, Jitter, TE/FE and PlexScan.

Here
is a result from a DVD+R scanned, notice that this screen changes when you
insert a CD or a Blu-Ray disc.

Here is the screen of the Jitter test done with a DVD+R.

Here
we have the Tracking Error (TE) and Focusing Error (FE) Measurement done with a
DVD+R.

The
last test scans the surface of the disc, and reports if it finds any errors.

The last part of the PlexUTILITIES allows
you to check for the latest firmware for your drive and also for the latest
version for PlexUTILITIES.

Let’s head on to the next page where we
will do some real world test ….

Real world tests

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Introduction:

On this page, the author of the review has
the freedom to run tests that she/he thinks will enhance the review. These
tests are unlike our standard tests, which we try to keep consistent throughout
the whole review team, so that our reviews are as consistent as possible. This
page gives the reviewer the opportunity to show some advanced and real world
tests that other review team members may not be able to run.

Real World tests:

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Real world tests are designed to simulate
what normal users might use their drives for in everyday use. For example,
writing discs with a burning application.

Audio Extraction:

For this test we used Exact Audio Copy
(EAC) to extract the audio to our hard drive. According to EAC the Plextor
PX-B310U support caching, accurate streams and C2 error,

Below are the results produced by EAC:

Burst
Mode

Secure
mode

The Plextor PX-B310U has an average
performance, in both tests as we can see.

Nero Burning Rom:

In the following tests we will burn discs
from the main media groups with Nero Burning Rom.

CD-R:

For our data writing tests, we simply set
up a new compilation of 699MB 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. (48x)

The Plextor PX-B310U burned our test CD-R
at 48x in 2 minutes and 43 seconds.

DVD R:

In this test we will measure the time for
writing to DVD R discs. We used Nero Burning Rom to burn a backup disc
containing 4305MB of data. We used the Disc-At-Once write method, selected
speed was 16x but the drive slowed down to 8x.

The Plextor PX-B310U burned our test DVD R
at 8x in 8 minutes and 41 seconds.

DVD DL:

In this test we will measure the time for
writing to DVD R DL discs. We used Nero Burning Rom to burn an mp3 disc compilation
containing 7.9GB of data. We used the Disc-At-Once write method.

The Plextor PX-B310U burned our test DVD R
DL at 8x in 17 minutes and 09 seconds.

CSS Encrypted DVD-Video ripping tests:

Most modern DVD burners don’t have Video
riplock and in most cases will read a pressed DVD-Video SL disc at 16x speed.
However, some drives use a CSS riplock when it comes to extracting data from
the disc. If you attempt to rip a pressed DVD-Video with CSS encryption to your
hard drive, then the ripping speed may be locked at a much lower speed than
16x.

We should point out, that ripping and compressing
a DL DVD-Video disc to DVD 5 format is quite CPU intensive. The more power your
system has, the less likely your system power will affect the results. The PC
used in this review is equipped with a fast Intel processor and fast hard
drives. We checked to make sure our review PC was not having an impact on the
results.

For this test we will use Fengtao software
DVDFab.

DVD-Video
single layer “Dario Argento's Phantom of the opera”

DVD-Video
double layer “Iron Man”

Blue-Ray
SL movie, “Underworld”

Blu-Ray
DL movie, “Quantum of solace”.

Thanks
to Fengtao software – For providing a full DVD Fab license.

The Plextor PX-B310U riplocked, the results
are very good if we consider the fact that this is a USB drive.

This concludes our Plextor PX-B310U review.
To read the conclusion, click on the link below

Positive:

• Excellent write quality with DVD±RW media.
• Generally good CD-R/RW writing quality.
• Stylish design.
• Excellent reading performance.
• PlexUTILITES.
• Very good build quality.
• Supports BitSetting (BookType DVD-ROM) on
  DVD+R/DVD+RW/DVD+R DL.
• Good community support here at MyCE.com.
• Excellent software bundle.
• Has a power off switch.
• A blue led instead of the typical green one.

Negative:

• DVD±R writing quality could be better.
• You need to manually set the booktype from
  PlextUTILITIES
• It couldn’t reach it’s max speed (16x) when
  burning.

Price

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We found the US price for the Plextor PX-B310U $139,99 at the time of writing.

Conclusion:

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

The main positive points:

The Plextor PX-B310U is a well build drive,
offers a lot of extra features in the PlexUTILITIES suite, it also comes with a
good software package that will cover all your burning and viewing needs.

It has excellent write quality in DVD±RW
media.

Reading performance was excellent for a USB
drive.

It can change the booktype on all +R media.

The Plextor PX-B310U has a beautifully
design with a blue led when it reads and writes on media.

The main negative points:

There are not many negative things to say about
the Plextor PX-B310U.

The main negative is the writing quality on
DVD±R media could be improved.

The other negative is that you need to use
PlexUTILITIES to change the booktype setting.

To sum up, this is what we would say:

“The Plextor PX-B310U is a good drive,
beautifully designed reliable, comes with a two year warranty, and the
performance overall is good”.

Because of the good feature set and
generally good reading/writing quality, we decided to rate this as “Good”.

 

Thanks to:

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