Customer Reviews

Iomega Super DVD 4X Writer All-Format ( 32680 )

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(9)

 

 

Iomega has done us all a service by providing this excellent piece of hardware that reads and writes all disc formats (DVD -R/W, +R/W, CD R/W) with little to no effort. Installation was easy and once I popped it into my machine it worked wonderfully.

Note, you must load the driver before installing the hardware.

The software provided is easy to use and does the job of burning any type of disc you can think of... This device is much cheaper in cost than say others, but there is no loss in any of the details or workings of this drive. I recommend it to anyone wanting to read or burn all formats of DVD or CD for music, data, or playing in your standard DVD player.

Promote now !!!

Sadly, I'd have to state that the Super DVD is not worth the money or the effort. It is very particular regarding the DVD media it'll handle and the software it ships with is deplorable.

When using the "HotBurn Pro" software in the advanced mode, it fails to recognize the media inserted in the drive and gives the following warning: "Warning - the requested image is too large for the disk. Current image size is 2237757 sectors. Maximum safe size is 330000 sectors."

When burning multiple disks, "HotBurn Pro" will burn the first disk successfully and though it reports a successful burn on the subsequent disk, the data is not viewable in either the Super DVD or other DVD readers.

When formatting a DVD RW upon completion of the process both the "Start" and "Close" buttons are disabled leaving no mechanism to gracefully exit. Also upon completion, it locks up the computer forcing the need to manual reboot. Finally, the help files cannot be found when the "Help" button is clicked.

Do not buy.

Im very surprised to see bad reviews for this product, may be its because I only use my writer for homeuse. It works wonderful. So far I bought 2 types of very cheap DVD+RW disks and it worked with both of them. For most of the cheap disks it just asked to format them (~25-30minutes) and the formating software is included too. (if it doesnt read ur blank disk - right click on the disk in "my computer" and choose "format" option)
It takes most of the movie files, like mpegs, AVI and DivX3, it doesn't take some DivX files though. I used it to make Anime DVDs from my bittorent files - and they were perfect!!!
Software is wonderful too - it lets you trim the movies (if the movie is too large you can shorten it by couple of Min/Seconds), also it lets you put a picture of your choice in the background and put a background music. And you can make a slide show and have it as an extra on your DVD Menu - its really cool ^-^.
The only bad thing I encountered so far was it takes forever to make a DVD >_< but thats because its external.
Oh and you need to have a DVDplayer that is "DVD+RW compatible" (PSII wont play them)

I bought the external Iomega DVD Super Burner because 1) it writes all formats, 2) the $30 rebate to compliment the already low price, and 3) I didn't want to buy an oem internal burner for my Dell Latitude c610. I also purchased DVD X Copy Gold (great application) to backup a few scratched DVD movies I bought over the years.

Anyway, the install was easy IF YOU READ the directions and don't have an outdated Operating System installed. I didn't have any problems burning movies nor data on DVD+-R discs. However, my laptop only supports USB 1.0 so I wasn't taking advantage of the lightning quick USB 2.0 standard.

So I bought a Belkin dual USB 2.0 slot PCMCIA card. I then had to update my Windows XP version to support USB 2.0. I didn't/couldn't install service pack 1 so I just installed the Iomega drivers/files from their support web site. This was a simple task. I believe the files were also on the Iomega CD but I wanted to make sure I had the latest file versions.

Anyway, now my DVD reading/burning times are 50%-75% better using the USB 2.0 technology. I use 4x DVD+R/DVD-R/DVD+RW Imation and Memorex discs w/o any problems. I have yet to have a failure during DVD burning to any format.

I purchased this SuperDVD product based on my experiences with Iomega in the past. This time I have to say that I was disappointed. Much to my dismay I found that it is limited as to what cd-types it supports. As a software developer we have a need to produce a lot of cd-copies each week. This one will not burn "silver" cd's. They are a relatively new item (couple of years) but every other burner in the office handles them just fine. Support from Iomega is limited to a "sorry your cd's are not on our approved list" and we have no plans to add any. It is too bad that the limited list is not on the packaging or sales liturature. In fact you are led to believe that all major cd-brands are supported. When contacted support told me to use only Verbatim or Memorex.

On the bright side it is easy to use and the hot burn UI works well.

The Super DVD burner has excellent build quality. A quite and smooth CD and DVD player. That said, do not buy or install until you have checked with iomega to see if CDW/RW DVD drive in your computer will not conflict with the iomega's burn programs. If their is a conflict and you attempt to install, you will not only discover that the burner will not work but you will spend hours patching the Windows XP burner program and reinstalling your present burner program. The DVDIT! and Hot Burn programs are loaded conflicts. Some vidio editing programs you may own (or plan to buy) will just not work. Iomega's support is fast but take their advice with caution. Some conflicts are "fatal" and you may end up with a burner that will sit on the shelf until you buy a new computer. A card that is packed with the burner states: "STOP! DO NOT return this product to the store! If you hit a snag, we can help you." If you are not 'up and running' and their techinical staff has not solved the snag in 48 hours, DO RETURN the product to the store. Five stars for build quality, three stars for technical help, one star for compatability of their burning programs.

This product is horrible. In the 20 years I have been tinkering with computers I have never come across such a worthless product (except for that Commodore 64 5 1/4 floppy drive that NEVER worked either). Out of the box, it failed to burn a single disk and locked-up three different systems, including my brand new laptop. The problem, random I/O errors, and system freezes. After 45 minutes on the tech support line (on my dime) I was finally given an RMA number and told to ship the unit back. A remanufactured unit showed up about two weeks later and the good news is that it can now produce one successful burn out of 3 or 4 tries (I guess if your media is cheap enough and you have a lot of time to waste, this would be acceptable). All of my successful burns are with third-party software. I have yet to get a single success with Hotburn Pro. I have tried Fugifilm, TDK, and TY media, all the same result. I have tried Nero, DVD decrypter, CDburner Pro, and Hotburn Pro. I have gone into msconfig and loaded minimal components, checked my drivers, etc. and have basically spent hours trying to get this thing to work consistently. Random I/O errors and freezes still plague the use of this unit. Hotburn Pro is another dismal story, too long to get into here. Read some of the comments above.

I've owned a lot of Iomega products over the past 10 years and have come to trust them. But this drive is a major disaster.

I have experienced most of the problems that other reviewers have complained about, including random hangs while writing, failure to recognize various types of media, undocumented I/O errors, and bizarre software problems about media sizes being miscalculated, and terribly slow write/format speeds. I will say that when I contacted their tech support, they suggested I switch the unit from my USB2.0 PCI card to the motherboard's USB1.1 port, and it did work much better, but of course it was unacceptably slow.

They do warn on their support page that USB2.0 add-in cards are not supported, but only built-in USB hardware. I don't know if that actually makes sense from an engineering standpoint; it sounds like a dodge to me. Why do all my other USB2.0 peripherals -- including an Iomega CDRW unit -- work on this same card? My guess is that this product was badly designed and probably rushed to market.

The only good things about it are HotBurn is pretty easy to use, the unit is quiet, and it looks nice.

Where to begin? It gave my Dell the Blue Screen of Death, locked up my computer, evaporated my active desktop. After trying to work with Iomega for 4 months, they sent me a replacement. No more Blue Screen, but no DVDs, either, just a huge pile of coasters. When the bundled MyDVD burning software tries to burn, it spits out the DVD and I get a "device error" error message. And yes, we downloaded the firmware update. Warning! Before you purchase, go go www.iomega.com and read the user forum for this product. The near unanimous verdict: completely nonfunctional product. I trusted Iomega, but don't make that mistake yourself.

This is a very useful product - if you like making $3 coasters. I was in need of an external DVD writer, and purchased this product in part based on Iomega's experience and reputation in the portable device space. I am a network engineer by trade, so needless to say I am somewhat resourceful in troubleshooting P.C. hardware and O/S issues. I have try have tried to create NTSC DVDs from projects created using the Sonic MyDVD software that is bundled with the device, as well as Intervideo WinDVD Creator, using several different PCs running both Windows 2000 and XP (fully patched). So far I have been able to create exactly ONE usable DVD in approximately 15 attempts. The problem is roughly the same each time - the software locks at the end of the burn phase. And, in typical device-with-bundled-software fashion, neither Iomega or Sonic's online tech support offers advice or even recognition of an issue. If you still want to roll the dice with this thing, my advice would be to purchase from somewhere where you have had good experience with the return policy.