do not i mean do not purchase plextor px-716a

ok heres the horror story i figured i go and get a new burner so i walk into best buy and i see a PLEXTOR on the shelves so being i never owned one and heard such good reviews about plextor i diecide to buy not one but four plextor burners being they are only 99 dollars. now mind you i have a machine that is way beyond the requirements of what is stated on the back on the box and so forth so i haul ass down the highway to get home and install the fuckers only to find that not just one but ALL FOUR were no fusking good i flashed them with the new firmware and everything still nothing i mean nothing i even gave two to a friend of mine who stays in front of his computer too see if it was my machine that messing things up and he gave them back to me within two hours and told me they were junk while laughing at me ...so the moral of the story is stay away from plextor...damn!!! i have never seen anything like it in all my years of buying things ecspecially electronic. well didn't mean to talk your ear off but i had to tell someone and kinda vent so im off to bed now so i can get up early to take this s*** back

 

fyi - READ THE MANUAL

i spent about 30 min trying to get mine and nothing. there is a very specific order in which you have to set this drive up or it will not work. they are the best drives money can buy - the PX-716UF is anyways. but every manufacturer has problems with some drives, this could be the case but i think i know why they didn't work......

user error is at the root of about 90% of the problems i see in this forum.

 

Maybe he should have ran the Self Test Diagnostics before flashing the drives.I have never had a problem with a Plextor drive,I have been waiting on the rebate for 5 months,Oh well.Now I know why I have all them dents in my car at least [bold]Operator Error!!![/bold]

 

aghost, I don't believe that I saw anything in your post that stated what problem you had with the drive(s). I could see that maybe one was bad, but when you say all 4 were bad, I would have to guess that you have something amiss with your computer. And, yes, I know that you said that your friend tried them.

Why don't you list your system specs, here, and what burning programs you have on your computer. Maybe one of us can help.

 

I have seen posts in several forums - all having major issues with this drive. I just bought a Plextor 716, but it is still in the box.

Many people praised the Plextor brand, so I bought one. But after seeing so many issues online, I'm getting cold feet and looking at buying the Sony DRU-720A (I have two DRU-710A's) or the new Memorex 16x16 releasing this month.

 

robtwilk, most of the problems that I have seen, with the Plextor 716A have either been operator error, or a problem corrected with a firmware update.

I just got my 716A, 2 weeks ago, and it is far and away the best Plextor that I have owned, and I have owned a number of them.

 

My father-in-law swears by his Plextor drives, so I thought they might be worth a try. Unless these users are complete newbies, I can't see what user errors would cause so many problems.

You stick it in the bay, screw in the screws, plug in the cables, make sure the jumpers are set to master/slave and your done. The firmware updates are a little more tricky, specially if the user doesn't know how to disable DMA.

I guess I can give the one I bought a try - I can always take it back if it doesn't work as well as my Sony's.

Thanks!

 

What really sucks is that you can't get a firmware update for the LG drive that came with my Sony. LG doesn't have one and Sony doesn't have one.

It's not worth any more of my time - I'll just buy a quality DVD drive!

 

Bought my Plextor 716A on Wednsday and I really like it alot better than what I had. Installed it and hardly read the instructions, runs fine and great.
One reason why i bought it I read that Plextor produces top of the line burners.

 

I don't have the internal model but I at least wanted to chime in to say my external Plextor PX-716UF is an awesome burner and has worked as advertised. I've only had it a short time though. Still think it's going to be a great burner in the future too.
Only issues I have experienced have been software related that I have solved when trying to use the Plextor with my other USB connect Iomega burner. Now I use both without issue.

 

I followed a link in the forums to DVD Burner Reviews. I was dissapointed that all of the drives had big misses in one way or another.

The Sony DRU-710A (I have two 700A's) had some big issues, as did the Plextor 716A. I couldn't find a drive that really stood out as a winner, at least not one with only minor issues. They all had error correction issues, burn quality issues, or something.

Here's a sample review of the Plextor 716A:

- The Good

16X recording speed for both DVD+R and DVD-R media
Supports most DVD+R DL media at 4X
Will support 6X DVD±R DL with firmware upgrade
Supports overburning with CD-R/RW media
Supports overburning with DVD+R media
Good DVD-R and DVD+R DL writing quality
High CD reading speed
Very fast ripping DVD-Video DL movies
Fast ripping for protected game discs, especially with Safedisk protection
Good CD error correction
Can be used to measure (scan) DVD±R/RW media with a variety of tests (PI/PIF/Jitter)
Can read/rip protected Audio discs (CDS200, Key2Audio)
Supports bitsetting for DVD+R and DVD+R DL formats

- The Bad

Cannot backup copy protected games with versions newer than 2.8 of SafeDisc protection
Doesn't support reading of DVD-RAM media
Reading performance with 90/99min test media
Many errors when backup CDS200 protected disc

- Like To be fixed

Burning quality with specific DVD media
Lower price to compete with upcoming Pioneer DVR-109, NEC ND-3520A
Poor DVD±RW writing quality
Poor CD recording quality
Bitsetting option for DVD+RW media to be added
Low DVD error correction with several test discs
Autostrategy/Intelligent recording

 

well i went and replaced them with the pioneer a09xl and they are running like champs at the same time i did the diagnostics test everything has worked out fine with these writers well the pioneers that is now for the plextors i went back to best buy and there were like four people in line that were bringing back those models not counting the ones that were behind the counter maybe the batch that best buy got were a bad batch.and dont think i dont know how to install them and what jumper settings to use as well as flashing them.they just are bad writers ive even went on other forums and people are complaining about them...well people holla back people and thanks

 

also too im very disapointed in sony they are really starting to get kinda crappy too. now when there 500 series was first introduced i was very happy with the performance being that the standard format which was considered top of the line writing speed at 4x dvd-r media was as such. now we get to the 700 series they cannot handle or do what they say they can.i burned different media at 8x using dvd-r media on most if not all of the new sony's even the external ones and...boom rings of saturn on the bottom of the disc not a clean even burn at all.the only thing im saying is when pushed to the limits of there capacity the burners do not hold up or they give a crappy burn.
holla back let me know what you think

 

lovin my 716a,200 backups and counting!

 

Great!! I bought mine from Best Buy. I have not installed it due to the bad rap I've been reading.

Anybody buy one from Best Buy and can say it's working well?

 

got mines from best buy

 

olamite - That's sounds like good news. I will open mine and install it this week. Hopefully I will be one of the satisfied customers.

Do you do any DL backups? I understand that the Plextor does not support bitsetting - which I understand to be important for burning DL discs.