Posted by Micro Henry on 11/16/17 11:40

***** Orig Post to rec.video.dvd.players Date: Tue, 07 Feb 2006 17:37:13 GMT

Hi All,

Just bought a 50PAK of Fuji DVD-R for my DVR-520. The Fuji 8X discs I have
been using have been replaced with 16X and the UPC code is the same for
both, UPC-7410175268. Don't know why they re-used the 8X UPC with 16X discs.
The drive in the 520 is an 8X drive but records at 4X when the 16X Fuji
discs are used.

I called Pioneer support for help twice. The first call acknowledged that
the unit did not recognize the speed code on the Fuji-16X and defaults to
4X. They recommend that I use only 8X discs. They also claimed that no
firmware update would be made!

I called Fuji about the problem, and they claim that all discs they make now
are 16X and all manufacturers are converting to 16X only. Buying 8X discs
is not a long term solution. Getting a firmware update is the only answer.

My second call to Pioneer gave me a slightly different answer. They claimed
that is firmware DOES recognize the speed code for 16X and would run at the
max speed of the drive. They concluded that the Fuji discs are defective,
and recommended buying a different brand. They recommended the following
brands in order of performance. TDK, Verbatim, Mitsita, and Maxell. Do not
use Memorex! and Sony may be a problem.

My question to the group is: Has anyone tried using 16X discs on their
Pioneer DVR-520H recorder yet? Do they record at the max speed of 8X? 8X
speed, copies an entire disc in 7 - 8 minutes. If it takes 14 - 16 minutes
to make the copy, it is running at 4X, the claimed default speed. Entire
means, a full 4.7Gbytes of programming.

Meanwhile I am looking to try a different brand to see if it fixes the
problem, as Pioneer claimed it would.

Please advise of your findings.

uH

=====================================================================
Follow up Post to rec.video.dvd.players Date: Tue, 07 Feb 2006 20:52:42 GMT

Hi,

Well, I bought Verbatim 16X discs. They also fail to copy at 8X.

So, I placed another call to Pioneer. Talked to Mike @ 1-800-872-4159. He
finally agreed that it is a firmware problem, and submitted a request to
engineering to update the firmware. He thought it would be a low priority
and not to expect anything to happen very soon.

Meanwhile, the only discs I am finding are 16X discs in almost all brands. I
found 1 50-spindle of SONY in 8X and bought it. My problem with Sony is the
top 2 and bottom 2 discs are usually bad, and at least one in the middle
does not work. But I bought it anyway.

I am passing the phone number along in hopes that all of you Pioneer
DVR-520H owners start calling, forcing this update to be a high priority.
Otherwise they will drop the ball and call it a consumer problem, ignore it
and hope it goes away. But it won't as more people learn that the 16X disc
don't work right.

If anyone else is having this problem please post and pass on the info.

uH

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