Digital Trends

Philips DVDRW228

March 3rd, 2003 | by Dan Gaul

Benchmarks:
Even though the capacity on disc is stated at being 4.7, I found that Nero would not let me burn over 4.5. A 4.5 data burn consisting of fairly large files (100MB to 700MB) takes an average of 24 minutes, 20 seconds at a transfer rate of 3,312 KB per second using Nero.

A 250MB DivX file took 15 minutes to burn, including file conversion and formatting, using Sonic MyDVD. The DVD was not playable in my 4 year old Sony DVD player, but did playback in a brand new Apex DVD player. This is typical for the DVD+RW format, where most new home DVD players play the media, but older DVD players will not. For a great listing of compatible players, go to DVDplusRW.org's compatibility list.

If you are curious why someone would choose DVD+RW over DVD-RW, here's a great reason why. With DVD-RW, the basic features of the DVD recorders are not accessible, like chapter stops, overwriting recordings, or adding a recording once the disc has been finalized. With DVD+RW, you do not have to worry about any of this. DVD+RW are always DVD video compatible.

I used Nero's DVD Speed to benchmark the drive.

System:
P3 1000
512 MB Memory
Windows XP SP1

Drive information
Vendor PHILIPS
Product DVDRW228
Firmware Version 1.13

Disc information
Type DVD-ROM
Length 4.36 GB

Test results

Transfer rate
Average 3.41 X
Start 3.39 X
End 3.87 X
Reading type CAV

Seek Times
Random Seek 143 ms
1/3 Seek 174 ms
Full Seek 115 ms

CPU usage
1X 1 %
Max Speed 2 %

Interface
Burst Rate 0.48 MB/s

Spin Up/Down Time
Spin Up Time 2.58 sec
Spin Down Time 1.55 sec
Disc Eject Time 2.05 sec
Disc Load Time 14.93 sec
Disc Recognition Time 0.00 sec

If you are also interested in the CD benchmarks, click here.