Can someone explain my burner's write strategy to me?

[king_tut]

Looking at these DVDInfo Graphs, I'd like to know why Buffer/Write Speed/Rotation decrease in roughly equal intervals. There is some variation, but after each variaton two or three gaps appear to be almost exactly the same.

Is this due to a flaw in the blank disk (at equal intervals?), bad buffering, or is it a write strategy (recalibration)?
Comparing various write graphs from the web, I've noticed some CAV-burners don't do this at all, while others do. My Sony/Optiarc AD-7173a (with Liggy/Dee firmware 1-M1) burns every CD or DVD like this, maybe except DVDR+DL (at 2,4x, a little hard to notice ).

It's not possible to zoom into the graph, so it's hard to say what happens first in these slow-downs, but it seems to be rotation speed decreases - that would indicate it's a burn strategy.

All burned with ImgBurn (from an NTFS drive) at high speeds, in Build Mode using SPTI.

CD


DVD

[dr_ml422]

Hi king_tut. Welcome. Seeing it's across the board on all three categories it might just be imgburn saving you from creating coasters due to not so great media. That's according to Lightning's guide on types of media and burning. That mcc media code is at the top in Blu's faq guide on types of media codes and their ranks, but taiwan and japan made are better than india. Now did you mean that the dls were burning at 2, 4x only and not the rest?

Also according to several posts here Sony/Optiarc hasn't been for lack of a better word, that great of a burner for a while now. I know we want speed and quality for the most part, but many have suggested burning cds at the highest speed of your burner and dvds at half the speed of the disc, which you may or may not have known already.

My best hunch is not so good media and maybe, but not certain your burner.

Check out Blu's signature for the faq on blank media codes or the faq guide in this burning/recording blank forum. It happened to me w/some sony discs using imgburn also.

[Chewy]

I am moving this thread to the Imgburn forum since LuK will see it there?

one word of warning that nec is not considered a good scanner

using cdspeed to do a trt or even using Imgburn to do a verify is probably more reliable

also posting a burn log would be more insightful

[king_tut]

These are just random graphs from my collection. I selected them because I thought they showed my point best... the pattern of burn speed drops in regular intervals (see post Nr. 1). Every disk burned with this burner has them. Please ignore any irregular errors!

The question is: Is it a fault or a feature?

Candidates:
1. burner's write strategy (recalibration ~ 600 MB/DVD, ~ 200 MB/CD), a feature
2. Imgburn or hardware buffer problems, an error
3. Media errors ~ every 600 MB/DVD, 200 MB/CD, a fault

... aargh, the MB scale on the CD screenshot (x-axis) is wrong.

Burn quality is not the issue here - yes, that burner is not top notch in burning and quality testing, but I'm quite satisfied with it... who cares? 2,4x seemed a good idea with 2,4x media The screens actually are from two categories (CD & DVD single layer), not three... Blank media is optimized for certain speeds, so you shouldn't go lower than half speed. Burn 16x at 12x, 10x or 8x at the lowest if you have problems, if you don't know that already... but I'm for religious freedom.

[blutach]

Seems like you're losing buffer momentarily and that is causing the downward speed spikes (check the white line at the top).

Regards

[king_tut]

That's what I thought initially, but the main thing seems to be write speed/rpm, they stay "in sync" even when there is no buffer drop.

I'm not quite sure about the buffer level, it says 20x-26x on the scale, but in Imgburn the buffer is almost running "dry". Is it a near-buffer underrun, or what does the DVDinfo scale mean?

Hmmmmmm.... seems you're right, write speed drops without buffer drops are very rare.

DVD


AAARRRGH... not another Imgburn problem... If any other proggie had these nice graphing features, I'd try it.
If it's the buffer, then it's most likely hardware-related. I have a penchant for crappy Asus boards with slightly screwed up IDE drivers*.

* Asus A7N8X-E, already using Microsoft IDE driver, nothing better I can do.

Any ideas from the Imgburn cracks? What could be the problem?

[blutach]

The buffer is read from the RHS of the graph. It should be near 100% (and is for the most part). It can drop if you are multitasking.

When your buffer drops, your burner says, I better consider burning at a lower speed and revs down (green graph). This obviously lowers the write speed (yellow line).

By the way, if you just wanna show write data, click on Show verify (cyan) in the lower right.

AAARRRGH... not another Imgburn problem...

This has nothing to do with ImgBurn. It is sending data to your burner which is not accepting it at that moment.

Regards

[Chewy]

2 Serial ATA channels via Silicon Image Sil3112À controller with RAID 0 and 1, 0+1 support

sata hard drive connected to this piece of work?

[dr_ml422]

My doctor always tells me we treat the symptoms forget about what's working or not. No need to really keep digging. the more we dig the deeper the hole. How do you get out of a hole?

[Chewy]

I went for almost a year with that motherboard having issues a lot worse than that, the original nvidia ide drivers would not roll back, the asus sil ones were broken, I found a web post about the newer ones sil released years after the motherboard went out of production, I tested them and then did a clean install not letting the ide take any nvidia
and loading the new sil at first load.

[king_tut]

It seems only to be happening on the Secondary Master, although I'd have to re-jumper to verify that. My other burner (2ndary Slave) is unaffected. Is it worth the fuss?

No. It may cost 2-5 Nero "quality points" , but it doesn't affect the verify speed or the quality graph in any noticeable way.

I've re-installed the latest Imgburn on a different partition for testing, and here are the results -


this time with processor usage. So multitasking shouldn't be a factor.

Nero claims an "average scanning interval" of 7 ECC for this burner, so the quality results are well within green range on this media type (Verbatim DVD+R Lightscribe, 10-disk spindle from Maxxtrade )

Another odd "feature" of this burner/configuration/board is very much hard disk activity when burning/verifying very many small files, a lot more than on the other drive. Sometimes the drive doesn't seem to work properly ("Incorrect function" with DVD+R DL and Multisession ISO+Joliet+UDF DVDs in Explorer, even though the media is undamaged & accessible via Isobuster - I've scouted for software issues already & don't have Easy CD Creator), quality scanning results may be slightly different after inserting a few other disks ... but so far, no data corruption (that I'm aware of). On the whole, much better than the old A7V-133 with the beloved Via 686B Southbridge Bug. Even though far too many Dual Layer Disks end up as coasters (on both burners)... I think I had them jumpered the other way around a year ago, but couldn't resolve that issue.

P.S. I don't use SATA and have long ago disabled the SATA driver (Sil3112 from Silicon Image) in Windows device manager.

[LIGHTNING UK!]

The dips in the buffer/write speed at regular intervals are just the drive performing WOPC type functions.

It's nothing to do with ImgBurn - and it's nothing to worry about!

If you want to see aggressive WOPC, look at an IBG from a Pioneer drive!

[king_tut]

WOPC = White Portland Cement ...?

Short for Walking Optimal Power Control II, WOPC II is an algorithm that dynamically adjusts laser power to optimize quality across different types of media.
Unlike other drives which preset the writing power before the actual writing of data, the Walking Optimal Power Control algorithm evaluates the writing quality constantly and adjusts the writing power accordingly in order to ensure the best possible writing quality over the entire disc. WOPC technology is commonly found in BenQ products which contain "Write Right Technology" which utilizes WOPC II.

This reply was sponsored by The Campaign to Promote Searching Before Asking.

(Source: http://club.cdfreaks.com/f92/what-wopc-155822/, also has some help about divorcing your wife)

Yeah, I'd like to see som WOPCs on Pioneer drives ... must be dropping to 1x, the poor folks!

[Chewy]

also has some help about divorcing your wife

Thanks for your opinion but the guy decided to have her flashed with the latest firmware and says everything works fine.

I must have had a bad flash