Digital Trends

Plextor PlexWriter 40x40x12x

March 10th, 2003 | by Dj Heinen

Technology

The first bit of technology used in the 40/12/40A is BURN-Proof. Short for Buffer UnderRuN-Proof, Burn-Proof allows the drive to momentarily pause the CD burning process in order to refill the drive's internal buffer. These stops cannot be noticed, and protect you from ruining a CD. Through all my experience with Plextor drives (with BURN-Proof), I have never made a coaster. The second, and most exciting, innovation is called PoweRec-II. PoweRec is a Plextor-specific technology that tests the CD-R/RW to find its maximum burning speed. In its second generation, PoweRec-II is allows you to burn at maximum speed, and maximum quality, on just about any speed-rated disk. This is reflected in my testing below.

Performance

It might be the software, the media, or just burning a CD at that high speed, but most of the time I burned a CD, afterwards, I would be alerted that I had averted a buffer under-run at least once. I never made one coaster, thanks to BURNProof. The drive has been out for a month now, and 40x media is nowhere to be found. Even 32x media is hard to find! So, I tested this drive with different kinds of 16x and 24x media, and the drive burned flawlessly at 40x, thanks to PowerRec-II. This was the same with the CD-RW media provided, it was rated 4x-10x, but it burned at 12x fine.

These numbers are incredible! Making a CD in 3 and a half minutes is a beautiful thing to witness. Nero calculates the burn time automatically, so I used it to time my results. These are only my individual results, yours may vary depending on how fast your computer is, and what software you use. (For stats on the test machine, click here.)

Conclusion:
The Plextor PlexWriter 40/12/40A is a great CD burner. It is crippled by the included software, however it can still flawlessly burn a CD faster than you can get your shoes on, and still has a moderate price tag! If you have an 8/4/32 drive, now would be a great time for you to upgrade. And those without CD Burners, this would be a great place to jump into the fray, because they cannot get much faster than this. If you have ever studied exponential growth, you know what I mean.