DVD burner buyers beware Sony DRU-510A has issues

chuckg31 · Post by **chuckg31** » Mon Jul 28, 2003 10:45 pm

Summary-If you are looking for a new DVD burner, beware of the Sony DRU-510A. It has “known problems” which cause it to stop working after an unknown number of uses.

Here is my story
I was looking for a DVD burner as an effective way to back up various video files and large directories. I figured that I would finally shuck out the big bucks and get a DVD burner because I was sick of having CD-R’s all over the place. I was looking at the current drives available. The most appealing was Sony’s DRU series because they could burn both + and – formats in DVD-R and RW. I went to purchase a DRU drive and the newest model was the DRU-510A, which was capable of burning a DVD-R at 4x. So, I paid $310.50 plus shipping for the drive.

I used the drive to do about 6 burns with the crappy bundled software. In my opinion, the bundled Veritas Record Now DX is a horrible DVD burning program. The bundled Sonic solutions MyDVD program was never even able to compile any of my projects without generating errors.

I had just finished a project and I was going to burn a 4gig folder onto a DVD-R.

I run a test, just to make sure it will burn. The test turns out fine. Ok, so I burn the project and it generates errors about ½ way though the burn. I say “son of a….there goes about $2 for a DVD-R”. So I try again and I get another DVD coaster. I then restart my computer and try to burn again only this time in 2x. I get another error and I attempt to abort the burn. The software aborts the burn process, but my drive is still burning WTF???

I wait 10 min and the drive is still burning. I restart my computer and am forced to use a paperclip to manually eject the drive. I remove the DVD-R and the drive still won’t respond and is still blinking like it is burning.

I called Sony Tech support and described my problem. They say “this is a known problem, here is your RMA #”. This makes me think. “Oh crap, I wish I would have bought the new +/- Pioneer DVD burner”.

Sorry for the essay about my problem, I just wish that someone had posted this before I bought my DRU-510A.

madmallard · Post by **madmallard** » Tue Jul 29, 2003 6:21 pm

did you bother trying CD burnign before in it?

chuckg31 · Post by **chuckg31** » Tue Jul 29, 2003 9:22 pm

I think your asking if I burnt any CD-R's in it before it screwed up?

Yes, I burnt one CD-R and it turned out fine. It was a data cd.

madmallard · Post by **madmallard** » Thu Jul 31, 2003 1:59 am

just used mine to make a DVD-r of a chinese knockoff.

works fine in pc and a proscan dvd, doesn't work in ps2

TaranT · Post by **TaranT** » Thu Jul 31, 2003 2:48 am

Other people are having the same problem:
http://club.cdfreaks.com/showthread.php ... adid=71811

http://www.dvdrhelp.com/forum/archive/t163356.html

Kind of glad I bought the Pioneer.

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chuckg31 · Post by **chuckg31** » Thu Jul 31, 2003 10:37 pm

Gee TaranT, thanks for making me feel even worse about my purchase. It happens though. Well, bad purchases that is. I can't believe that the DRU-510A could be that crappy. I shipped mine to California yesterday so I could get it replaced. I have a very bad feeling though that the next drive I get will also be faulty. I wish that they could just give me my money back so I could buy a pioneer.

I think that the general consumer is starting to become very irritated with Sony. I know many people that have had numerous problems with their Playstation 2's, including myself. Luckily mine weren’t that severe.

Oh yeah, TaranT. If your avatar and signature are for the purpose of promoting Delerium it worked on me. I just bought that CD after I got the sample from their website.

TaranT · Post by **TaranT** » Fri Aug 01, 2003 3:53 am

chuckg31 wrote:...If your avatar and signature are for the purpose of promoting Delerium it worked on me. I just bought that CD after I got the sample from their website.

Good deal. And just in time: I'm planning on changing in the next day or two.

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dokool · Post by **dokool** » Sun Aug 03, 2003 10:25 am

I have the DRU-500a and had no problems with it. Yay for being an early adopter!

-DOKool

madmallard · Post by **madmallard** » Sun Aug 03, 2003 2:26 pm

whups, i have a 500ax too. just made a +R and works fine

J89idsioss · Post by **J89idsioss** » Mon Aug 11, 2003 6:21 am

Sigh. SONY strikes again.

What happened SONY? About 4 years ago I bought a SONY minidisc player. That thing is the greatest in the world, never a problem.

3 years ago:
I buy a PS2, it breaks. My friends all buy a PS2, they break.

1 year ago:
I buy a SONY car stereo, it's in the repair shop right now...

I'll never buy a sony optical disc product again. Even the blank media they make is broken. Some of their other stuff they make is fine though.

What happened?

That sucks though. Hope SONY doesn't make getting a replacement a pain, 'cause it takes them forever to do warranty repairs.