Info on Yamaha's new CRW-F1 (44x24x44) ???

[computer]

Does anyone have any *inside info* on the new Yamaha CRW-F1 CDRW drive (actual REAL release date, MSRP, street price, anything bad about it, etc)? All I have been able to find on it from Yamaha is at the Europe Yamaha site, nothing at the USA site. They have some info on it here at their multimedia site, but it's only about it's technology. Looks like this drive is going to blow away all other CDRW drives. 44x24x44, 8mb burn proof buffer, and the drive can laser label the face of the media (text or graphics) without the need for labels. I'd like to hold out and get one of these, but if it's going to be something like over $200 street and or not available for a long time, I'll pass for now.

More info
More info 2

Thanks.

 

[tazdevl]

Proably about 150 for the internal in the US. Externals are always a bit more pricey.

 

[pookieguy]

Anyone know where I can pre-order one of these babies??
Personally, I'm waiting for this one.
Yamaha drives are great and the Disc Lasering system is just too good to pass up!

All the info available is "Coming July 15th" but that's it!

Surely, there has to be an online shop at least taking pre-orders?

Thanks

--
miguel

 

[computer]

No, I still haven't seen any. All Yamaha will tell me is "look at the page".

 

[Goosemaster]

$200!!

Are you joking? Seriously, that device is worth at least $300 if not more

Stop being greedy :|













I would LOVE to have this device for $150-200 depite my moral delimemmas

 

[tazdevl]

The externals are supposed to be over $200 and come out in August, internal is less... ~$150. I've exchanged a couple of emails with the product manager and review units are on their way @ the end of this week, so we should see reviews next week. Drive should be widely available the following week.

FYI it seems LiteOn is releasing a 48X24X48 drive in the next coupl of weeks and a 52X32X52 drive next month. These drives are based on a new Mediatek chipset, so perhaps some of the write and compatibility issues will be addressed/fixed with the new drives. Given how quickly LiteOn is ramping things up... I doubt it. They seem to want to compete solely based on speed and price, forgetting write accuracy. Also, 48X media is being released by Mitsui, Imation and Ritek.

I recently purchased a 48125W and returned it. LiteOn's are well know for media compatibility issues and writing quality that isn't up with Plex, Teac and Yamaha. I tried several kinds of discs, rated from 32X to 40X, reduced the writing speed etc... bottom line is that I always got errors. I did finally find some that worked well and the drive wrote it to without errors @ max speed... Taiyo Yuden 40X media from CD Dimensions. But it pissed me off that I had to hunt around for something that worked so I RMA'd it and am waiting without a burner for the Yamaha to hit the streets.

I've searched pricewatch the past couple of days and no one has it for pre-order. I would wait for a review or two. While I think this will be a great drive, you want to be sure it does write and re-write well before pulling the trigger.

 

[computer]

Thanks for the info. Yeah, I DO intend on waiting for a review of it.

Let me guess....the 52x Lite-On will have only a 2mb buffer!

 

[tazdevl]

Correctomundo... y'know, I doubt that adding an extra 6 MB to the buffer would add significantly to the cost and it allows them to be competitive on features.

 

[Mavrick007]

It's not the 48x write speed or whatever, it's the rewrite speed that I'm looking for. I would like to do a cdrw disc in under 4 minutes.
I saw a report about the 48x24x48x being released overseas at the time of the 48x12x48x drive here and I was hoping that I'd see one here too.

Hehe That's usually the way it is when I upgrade. I buy a 40x12x48x drive one day and the next they have something better. If there's something good coming out in the next month or so, I just might buy it and sell this one cause I haven't used it yet and my friend here wants one.

I would definitely go with the Yamaha, they have been a leader for a long while and this one took it's time coming out (previous best from Yamaha was the 24x model 3200). I'm sure that it's definitely going to be a winner and it's being released "worldwide" on July 15th.

 

[tazdevl]

I don't think I'm buying another LiteOn. I'd rather pay a premium and get a drive that doesn't piss me off.

 

[Maverick]

It'd be stupid to release this thing at anything more than $200. You can buy DVD recordable drives that also do CDR and CDRW for almost $250 now. I know I'm not gonna pay an extra $50-100 for that laser writing capability. I'll stick with my $1.00 sharpie and get the ability to record on higher capacity media.

 

[pookieguy]

This is great!
I'm definately waiting for this drive.

If you read the last piece of the puzzle, the internals WILL come in white AND black.
Black with blue LED. At least they are getting away from the VERY boring beige drives we have come to hate.

I'm sure the black drives are gonna be harder to find though...
If anyone see them, please post and let me know.

Thanks,

Miguel

 

[tazdevl]

I never said the internal was going to be more than $200. It is supposed to be ~$150.

External drives are always more than internals, why? Because they require more work to develop. Yamaha is also doing some great work in terms of interface support... SCSI and a USB2/Firewire version for the external. Internal will be IDE/SCSI capable. Mighty impressive.

Go look @ newegg.

Iomega Predator CD-RW 24x10x40 EXTERNAL USB 1.1 & 2.0 Drive $181
Plextor CDRW 8X8X24 Recorder USB2.O EXTERNAL Drive $190
PLEXTOR PX-W4012TA/SW INTERNAL $127

The Plex is the most expensive internal IDE drive on the market right now. Look at the speeds of those external drives vs the Yamaha which is 44X24X44 Full CAV. Does the pricing make more sense now?

Let's also remember there is no set format yet for DVD, the discs are rather expensive, writes are slow and the technology/drives aren't really mature yet.

People who buy DVD writers now were probably first in line for betamax VCRs when they first came out.

Miguel I doubt you will see a black drive for a while. I think they are focusing on the most important thing which is to get the drives on the market. Internal IDE drives will be released early to mid-July, SCSI internal late July-early August, externals August. Ever notice that black drives always seem to show up several weeks after a company launches a product? I don't think things will change for this drive.

I also think some people might have misread the press release and inferred that the $300 software bundle was the price of the drive. Bundling is a common marketing strategy and does not mean that things will cost anywhere near that much. I bet the actual cost of that when added to the drive is no more than $20-25.

 

[Pabster]

Sorry to hear about your troubles with LTN48125W. I've got 3, all using the latest VS06 firmware. No problems writing 48X to a variety of media (and, yes, I've tested ). Taiyo Yuden, of course, fare the best ... but I've got hundreds of 12X-rated Imation (CMC) which also work perfectly @ 48X. In fact, the only media I had that wouldn't work consistently (well) at 48X was Maxell.

Lite-On has a great drive with 48125W. The fact that media isn't keeping up with CD-R speeds is not Lite-On's fault. Other high-speed writers experience similiar issues (just look at how finicky Plextor's 40X is, I know ).

 

[tazdevl]

The media worked, but it had between .11% and 8% C2 errors which is unacceptable in my eyes. A fast burner should burn fast and accurately... the 48125W doesn't and a fair number of other folks have found the same thing. Not sure if it's spotty manufacturing quality or what. Also, I didn't notice a difference with media compatibility between VS02 and VS06 with better qualty burns going to VS02.

Have you run Scandisc and taken a look @ your burns? You're getting 0% errors? You burning @ max speed? I'm guessing probably not or you're getting errors but don't mind since the disc can be read.

In my eyes it is LiteOn's fault. If they release a drive that burns faster than the current rated media on the market and the end result is errors... they have 2 choices 1) Hold off until at least 1 brand gets on the market or 2) Make SmartBurn a bit more effective. Otherwise at a minimum you need to manage your customer's expectations and proactively communicate with them, IMO they haven't.

Marketing is a bit more than just pushing out the fastest product time after time. They haven't picked up on that. Teac, Plex and Yamaha have the reputations they have for the very reason that they focus on the customer experience, quality and speed.

 

[computer]

Speaking of "PC beige" Vs Black drives......I recently had to paint some drives to use in my Antec 1040B clone (which of course is black). As for a floppy drives go, Sony are the easiest. Bezel pops right off for easy painting. The bezel on my Asus CD-S520 (52x CDROM) was a PAIN, it wouldn't come off. I had to do the masking tape bit on it and left the door alone to preserve the "Asus" logo. Looked really bad, so went ahead and painted the door also. No more "Asus 52x" on the front now. Be nice to be able to find some white Asus decals. I wanted the Teac 540E (40x12x48) in black AND RETAIL, and they don't make them. I wanted the retail over the black, so I had to get a retail white and will paint it. For those of you entertaining the idea of painting; if the headphone jack is chrome and you want to keep it that way, I just put a same diameter screw in it, one that the screw head just barely covers the jack. For the LED(s), I use this "clay type substance" called "tack" that you use to hang (for example) pictures on a wall. It has strong COhesive properties, but weak ADhesive properties, meaning it will stick to itself better than other objects. I get a very tiny piece of it, just large enough to cover the LED, mold it somewhat into the shape of the LED then place it over the LED with something like a very tiny jeweler's screwdriver. After paint is dry, just peel it off. Hopefully the Teac 540E will have a removable bezel and all this won't be necessary with it.

The best paint I've found that matches nicely the Antec clone black color, is "Dutch Boy Fresh Look Acrylic Enamel" in Satin black (spray can). It's slightly more glossy than the case itself. If you want it to match the case EXACTLY, get the flat black in that brand. Dries in 15 minutes to be re-coated, or sanded (600 grit emery) then re-coated. Handle in 2hrs.

 

[tazdevl]

FYI... I heard through the grapevine that there was a slight problem with Nero that could delay reviews a bit. I don't know if it will affect the time it takes to reach retail.


I don't bother painting, I just stealth mod everything.

 

[bwass24]

Has anyone seen this drive in the wild yet? The release was supposed to be on July 15, but I don't see the drive available in any of the usual places.

 

[JeSpre]

This drive is available in a few flavors on yamaha's online store. ETA is 8/1 for most and I think 8/12 for the black IDE one. Price was $180/$200 for the white/black IDE versions.

 

[computer]

Hmmm, thanks.

 

[RalfHutter]

I just ordered the internal SCSI version from Mwave for $230. They claim it's in stock (actually they claim ALL of them, black and beige, IDE, SCSI, firewire,internal, external are in stock - look at my link). I'll see in a few hours when I go pick it up at will-call.

 

[RalfHutter]

BTW - cdrinfo has a review of the IDE version here. . Posted yesterday. About 10 pages long.

 

[Goosemaster]

dada Damn:Q.....I Just found my new burner..


scsi Externel baby..or maybe internel....hmmmmm

 

[RalfHutter]

Originally posted by: RalfHutter
I just ordered the internal SCSI version from Mwave for $230. They claim it's in stock (actually they claim ALL of them, black and beige, IDE, SCSI, firewire,internal, external are in stock - look at my link). I'll see in a few hours when I go pick it up at will-call.

Damn Mwave.

The website showed ALL of them in stock, it let me order the internal SCSI version, completed the order, gave me an order number and when I called will-call at 10:00 to make sure it was ready for pickup they told me "they aren't in stock, the expected arrival date is 8-5-2002. Then I went back to the webpage and everything had been changed to "not in stock" with expected arrival dates of 7-30 to 8-5. What a bummer, man. :disgust:

 

[computer]

That's typical for an online vendor. Happens to me all the time and I certainly raise hell about it too all the time and so should you. Give 'em hell at ResellerRatings.com and elsewhere, they deserve it. NOW, they all say "NO STOCK".