[Dakman2000]

Ok, I just bought a new PB 15" 1.67
I have read about issue when it comes to burning at 8x in these ne PB's, well I have read also that these things are shipping with different drives? Here is my profiler info

Manufacturer:MATSHITA
Model:MATSHITA DVD-R UJ-835E
Revision:GAN7
Serial Number:
Drive Type:CD-RW/DVD-RW
Disc Burning:Apple Supported/Shipped
Removable Media:Yes
Detachable Drive:No
Protocol:ATAPI
Unit Number:0
Socket Type:Internal
No where does it say I have +/-R support in this drive, AND to top it off I can't burn my 8x media at 8x, only 2X, I use Ritek which is basically Verbatim media.
I want to know if I need to call Apple support about this.

[Southern_Gent]

I am having the same problem. I have the same drive as you in my 15" 1.67ghz PBook, but I can only burn at 1X. While I am given the option of 8X, it takes an hour to get a full DVD burned. I will be calling Apple support and will let you know what they say.

[PaintedOver26K]

same here... odd that was the same drive my old ti had i think,....

[Nobody]

Well, i would definetely buy an external dvd burner (16x). Why settle for the 8x on the superdrive?
I have not found enough value in buying a 300 us$ more expensive model pb when you can buy the combo drive PB for 2,000.
Anyway, when i want to burn dvds i am at home, so that may not be everybody's case.

[Boris]

Has anybody called Apple support? What was the explanation?
Thank you.

[PaintedOver26K]

anyone got anything yet?

[toddeastman]

Having the same problem. See the Apple discussion board:
http://discussions.i...TAa.5@.68a7ba65

It's a problem Apple needs to face. No one seems happy with this drive. Send Apple your feedback:

http://www.apple.com.../powerbook.html
Here are my test results for different media with my "Psudo-Drive":
Here are the data rates through each burn zone since this writer is zCLV. Data rates were taken from Activity Monitor sampling at 1 sec intervals. I personally can't fit any more data onto a DVD-R so it's safe to say that this is a full burn.
Media Type: TDK 8x DVD-R coded as TTG02
Toast/drutil reports media as: 8x
Filesize: 4473.3MB
Reported time to burn: 6:52 (412 sec)
Actual time to burn: 12:43 (763 sec)
Time 0:00 = 2.5MB/s - 3MB/s (2x)
Time 1:47 = 5MB/s - 5.5MB/s (4x)
Time 6:31 = 7.5MB/s - 8MB/s (~6x)
Time 11:16 = 5.5MB/s - 9MB/s (~6.5x) data rate very inconsistent in this zone
---------------------------------------
Media Type: Generic 8x DVD-R coded as FUJIFI..LM0
Toast/drutil reports media as: 8x
Filesize: 4473.3MB
Reported time to burn: 6:52 (412 sec)
Actual time to burn: 12:45 (765 sec)
Time 0:00 = 2.5MB/s - 3MB/s (2x)
Time 1:47 = 5MB/s - 5.5MB/s (4x)
Time 6:31 = 7.5MB/s - 8MB/s (~6x)
Note: This disc changed velocity only 3 times. the other discs changed four times.
-----------------------------------------
Media Type: Fuji 8x DVD-R coded as TYG02
Toast/drutil reports media as: 8x
Filesize: 4473.3MB
Reported time to burn: 6:52 (412 sec)
Actual time to burn: 12:53 (773 sec)
Time 0:00 = 2.5MB/s - 3MB/s (2x)
Time 1:48 = 5MB/s - 5.5MB/s (4x)
Time 6:31 = 7.5MB/s - 8MB/s (~6x)
Time 11:21 = 6.5MB/s - 9MB/s (~6.5x) data rate very inconsistent in this zone
The media seemed pretty consistent across the board. As you can see, the drive never hit the 11MB/s data rate to claim 8x in these tests. All of these tests were done with Buffer Underrun Protection (BUP) on. It's interesting that with BUP off I would get an underrun error in the last burn zone MAYBE when the drive was trying to hit 8x. That brings up a nasty possibility...is the PowerBook even able to transfer the data fast enough to the drive to write at 8x? The 5400RPM drive should have no problem but I had a buffer underrun consistently at this point in the burn. The BUP could also account for the inconsistent data rate in the last burn zone as it struggled to keep the data coming in.

[Pilot]

Does this affect PB's or iBooks too?

[Paul_Aris]

I don't know anyone on a mac or PC that burns a DVD Movie faster than 4-6X successfully. Usually when you dealing with video and audio together you need to burn a a slower speed.

[toddeastman]

I can hit 8x on my G4 desktop regardless of what I burn. Not a problem there. Activity Monitor reports the data rate hits 8x. These new PowerBooks.....problem. That problem is either a batch of bad DVD drives, a problem with the bus between the HDD and the drive, or simply false marketing by Apple. This is advertised as an "8x SuperDrive" after all in BIG BOLD letters all over the PowerBook page. Take a look:
http://www.apple.com...superdrive.html
I did not get what I paid for. If the data rate would just come close to 8x I would be fine, but it is not so. This Apple faithful of many years feels betrayed. Why does my new PowerBook get smoked in DVD burning by my friends 7 month old Dell??? His not only hits 8x on single layer discs (with any brand of 8x media he throws at it) but it burns Dual Layer as well!! It's really not good. Plus he paid less for the laptop. Why did I bother with a PowerBook......I'm starting to wonder.
I wish Macworld would have checked the actual burn speed and data rate when they did the tests for the latest issue.

[PaintedOver26K]

if this is all true man.. i feel burned...gotta call apple and find out

[toddeastman]

It's true but Apple will probably not tell you anything except there is not problem and to buy Apple media. It easy to test your drive though. You need to burn an entire 4.4GB disk as Apple techs claim that the drive hits 8x (11 MB/s) during the last 15% of the burn. That brings up a whole other marketing issue but back to this one. Anyway, open Activity Monitor hit Cmd-1 if the window does not open. Click the Disk Activity Monitor. Watch the data in/sec and data out/sec rates (sorry I dont remember which) when you start your burn with the Finder or Toast. DVD rates to watch for:
1x: 1.385 MB/s
2x: 2.77 MB/s
4x: 5.54 MB/s
8x: 11.08 MB/s
This drive is VERY picky about the types of 8x media (another bad thing about it). You can see my previous post for media that the drive sees as 8x (but doesnt seem to burn at that speed). Stay away from Memorex is my experience with my drive. Good luck! Please post your results.