Page 1 of LiteOn DVD writer only £17.99 +p&p

at SVP
How cheap can these things get?
According to the review, it can be flash upgraded to write DVD-RAM as well. Have ordered one (arriving tomorrow) and will try it out.

Would love to hear what its like...

I have a friend who is a field service eng.... he won`t touch LiteOn with a barge pole.... They make very good laser units.. infact alot of other DVD-R`s have LiteOn lasers in... but they make terrible electrics.....

Mind you for 18 notes your really can`t go wrong......

This item was edited on Thursday, 6th July 2006, 09:57

LiteOn used to have a good reputation for their CD-Rom drives (used to make them for Sony - maybe still do); however I don`t think they are noted for making outstanding DVD writers though I suspect theire probably acceptable.

I used to always buy LiteOn Drives but moved away from them due to poor quality burns on various media. I bought a Pioneer 111D last week & am delighted with it. Even better than my NEC drives, which have always been good.

Spend a couple of quid extra & go for Pioneer

I received the drive from SVP the next day (great service from them as usual). Then I tried to upgrade it to DVD-RAM without success :(
Taking the anonymous SVP reviewer`s comments literally, it should have been easy. The DRW-6S160P is supposed to be identical to the SHW-160P6S and the SHM-165P6S which supports DVD-RAM, just different firmware.
The official LiteOn firmware upgrades do not allow you to upgrade a drive to a different model. But I soon came across a program called FlashFix and the CodeGuys website which contains crossflash patches, enabling one drive model to be flashed with another drive`s firmware.
I downloaded the flashfixed SHM-165P6S firmware and upgraded my drive. The upgrade appeared to complete successfully, and afterwards Windows detected it as a DVD-RAM drive instead of a DVD-RW . However, the drive busy light was flashing constantly, even with no disc in the drive, and when I inserted any disc, the drive said it was empty. Completely useless. >:(
I successfully flashed the drive back to a SHW-160P6S and it started working again, but without DVD-RAM support, of course. I even tried downloading firmware from the official LiteOn site which was more up-to-date, then patching it myself - same result. It appears to be no-go.
I`m annoyed at myself - I really wanted DVD-RAM to work. I have a few DVD-RAM camcorder discs to copy across. I should have bought the Pioneer drive instead. I`ve wasted more time than it`s worth (there`s only a few pounds price difference.) Unless anyone else can show how to make it work, I advise against trying to convert this drive.