AdminXP.com: Introduction of the PLEXTOR 24/10/40A CD-RW drive

Introduction of the PLEXTOR 24/10/40A CD-RW drive

www.plextor.com

The PLEXTOR company is well known for its high-quality CD-RW drives. This time, I would like to introduce a Plextor´s 24x-speed drive - 24x speed means that a CD is created in about 5 minutes. Those who even do not find this enough attractive can browse for new powerful model 40/10/40A which is now available in two colors - black and classical gray.

CD ejection - the Eject button/Eject emergency by help of ejection button
Light indication - green (CD in), yellow (reading), orange (recording - the light blinks as fast as the drive burns)
Headphone volume control
Headphone output - Stereo mini-jack, 0.8V / 32 Ohms (Headphone Jack - Stereo mini-jack, 0.8V at 32 Ohms)

(Power Supply - DC +5V a DC +12V; Audio Connector - Analog output (Molex Connector), Digital SPDIF output)

Nero CD Speed

Windows XP, AMD Thunderbird 1000/266Mhz, MSI K7 Turbo

Package contents

PX-W2410TA drive
NERO 5.5.3.5 burning ROM - you should rather download the trial version 5.5.7.2 from Internet which functions as upgrade when you install the original version.
CD with PLEXTOOLS - is a SW which contains functions such as: displaying information about the drive, detailed drive settings (e. g. BurnProof deactivation), information about medium, multimedia player, Wav and MP3 converter, "Create audio CD" function, copying of CDs at once and deleting CD-RW media. Electronic manuals in several languages (I recommend you should read them in order to get familiar with the drive).
Burning media: 1x CD-RW (650MB 10x), 1x CD (650MB) (both CDs could already have 80 minutes :(((
1x data transfer cable for connection of disk controllers. 1x audio-cable for connecting of the drive to the sound card.
4x screws, 1x ejection button designed to help in case the CD gets blocked in the drive and a jumper for setting up the drive as Master or Slave.
Brief printed installation manual in several languages.

Technical specification

Support of the BURN Proof and PoweRec II technologies
BURN Proof - Buffer UndeRuN Proof - In simple words, we can say that this technology has been developed to protect media from insufficient data supply speed, when being burned. If data are not supplied, burning gets interrupted and when the data are available, it starts working again. The support must be contained in both the drive and the SW, as well. (plextor - BURN- Proof) (sannet - BURN-Proof) (BURN-Proof is a trademark of SANYO Electric Co.,Ltd.)
PoweRec II Technology (Plextor Optimised Writing Error Reduction Control) (plextor - powerec) - Technology designed to define proper maximum speed for burning media.
Z-CLV - Zone CLV Recording - recording method. If higher speed is used to burn, the medium will be divided into zones, each one is then burned at different speed (e. g. if you burn at 24x speed, the tracks stored at the inner part of the CD are burned with 16x, following part 20x and the rest 24x). The reason is obvious - turns remain the same, but the tracks have each different length. The data transmission speed rises when the reading mechanism comes near the outer edge of the CD. You can test the reading speed in the Nero CD Speed program. (sannet - zoneclv.html)
Recommended configuration: CPU 300Mhz and higher, 64MB RAM, OS Windows 95 and higher. Hard disk with enough free space (20MB for software and c. 1GB for copying and creating CDs).
Performance - recording 24x, rewriting 10x, reading 40x - Write 24X: 3600KB/s Z-CLV; 20X: 3000KB/s Z-CLV; 16X: 2400KB/s CLV; 12X: 1800KB/s CLV; 4X: 600KB/s CLV; 1X: 150KB/s CLV; ReWrite 10X: 1500KB/s CLV / 4X: 600KB/s CLV; Read 17X-40X: 2.6-6.0 MB/s CAV / 14X-32X: 2.1-4.8 MB/s CAV / 8X: 1200KB/s CLV / 4X: 600KB/s CLV
Access time: 140ms
Data Buffer: 4MB
Supported formats: burning modes - CD-ROM Modes 1 and 2, CD-XA Form 1 and 2, CD-DA, CD-I, Video CD & Photo CD. Creating Audio CD, CD Extra, Enhanced CD, Photo CD, CD-I & Video CD Titles.
Burning methods- Disc-at-Once (DAO), Track-at-Once (TAO), Multisession, Packet Writing
Reading and creating information about media: CD TEXT
Supported media length: 650MB (74min) a 700MB (80min), (unofficially - 790MB (90minutes))
Interface - ATAPI Interface (PIO Mode 4, Multiword DMA Mode 2, UDMA/33 Mode 2)
Size: 146 x 41.3 x 202 mm
Weight: 1.2kg
Reliability - MTBF 60.000 POH (15% duty cycle), Tray Loading Eject 100.000 times
Warranty: 2 years

Briefly....

Plus - Support of nearly all new technologies and standards (BURN-Proof, PoweRec II, burning methods). Good reading and burning speed. 2 years warranty.
Minus - Higher price.