Customer Reviews

Sony DRU-720A Internal DVD+R Double Layer/DVD+RW (4X+R, 16X+RW, 8X-R)

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

I was holding off buying a DVD burner until I could get my hands on the (relatively) new Plextor 16x double layer burner at a reasonable price. However, it appears that Plextor burners (the benchmark for optical drives) are being plagued by quality problems at the moment, so I was forced to look elsewhere. I stumbled upon the Sony DRU720A at my local retailer, got a good price (not as good as the current offer here at Amazon!) and took it home, not expecting much.

My main purpose for the burner is to make backups of roughly 100 DVD's containing home video, transferred from VHS using a set top DVD recorder. So far, I have burned just short of 40 discs with the Sony, and I am pleasantly surprised! My Windows XP machine recognized the drive right away and the included Nero software installed without a hitch. I haven't tried all the software bits yet, mainly the DVD copy function which works great. I'm using Sony 8x DVD-R media off a spindle and haven't had a single failure yet.

Based on my experience so far I have no hesitation recommending this drive. And, at the price advertised above, this must be just about the best value for a brand name DVD burner out there right now.

I bought the Sony DRU720A last month. First thing I did was to change the bezel cover to black (which is thoughtfully provided) to go along with my PC's color. All the necessary cables/screws/manuals are provided. It installed under Win 2000 without any trouble - double-check that the Transfer mode for the IDE Channel connected to the drive to "DMA Mode" as it makes a HUGE difference in the CPU usage for older computers. This is accessed in Win 2K by Control Panel -> system -> Hardware -> Device Manager -> IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers

I have used the drive to create and backup around 40 DVD's and CD's. The drive creates DVD+R's consistently at 16x without any problems. Also created CD-R's at 40x without any problems. In short it does everything I expected from it quite well (though haven't tried creating any Dual Layer DVDs yet).

My complaint (which is why 4 stars rather than 5) is with the accompanying Nero software suite. The suite is a mess of utilities and it takes a while to figure what is useful for what, or even what works (I cannot get the DVD player software to work). Recommend to update to the latest version from the Ahead software website (its free). The software is powerful enough for advanced users but is hard to use for users with simple tasks in mind - like quick backup or burning.

Overall, would definitely recommend the product. Just be prepared to have a little patience with the Nero suite.

The first drive worked great on the test, then the CD burner died the next time it was used... Then was replaced (by Sony) 2 more times with drives that were DOA. Sony takes forever to replace parts these days, and they lost the drive that THEY had the carrier pick up because it was packed incredibly poorly), and 2.5 months roughly after that I called to see why they hadn't sent another replacement drive... They said they "don't have any record of receiving the drive." I asked why they hadn't checked their account from the carrier THEY had pick up the drive in 2 months, and got no answer, other than they'd send out another drive & I'm STILL waiting for it!!! I've seen a number of "ban Sony" web sites (after researching this) and I can see why! Their customer service AND their product quality has definitely gone to the dogs IMHO. Where most companies I work with will ship-swap an item and have it to me often in days (Or in some cases even the next day), Sony will not do that, and it was like pulling teeth to get them to replace the last drive that had about 4" of play in the box on one side with NO padding at all between the box and the drive, so it likely ate it in shipping, and now they say they no longer even make this drive! They decided all by themselves to send an "upgrade" without checking to see if it was even compatible with the system it was being used in (even though they have a submission for errors to get their drives working and we went through a BIOS flash and STILL to no avail - this was with the first drive, which simply failed after one use!)

I'm steering clear of Sony for especially massive jobs from now on & buying hardware from more reliable sources with better return policies. Plextor has better customer/retialer service in my experience, so for any upgrades, OR any future hardware puurchases after this expereience, I'll be looking for "other than Sony" parts and customer service.

After 1 year of ligth use, the drive will not read DVD's anymore! it cam read/burn CDs. but not DVDs...

RECEIVED DVD PLAYER, INSTALLED SAME IN COMPUTER, WORKS GREAT. SOLVED AN OLD PROBLEM I HAD WITH AUDIO OUTPUT. NO COMPLAINTS AM SATISFIED.SON

Works great havent tryed all types of media yet but im very happy great drive and hte price is right

I expected a little more from sony next time i purchace i will buy a plextor. some strange audio problems during playback of dvd,s. just didn't get that wow that you come to expect fron sony products

I'v had my dru-720a for about 4 month and worked pretty well until about 2 weeks ago - now when burning a movie, single or DL, it either fails immediately or starts crawling at some point at 1% every hour or so (newer firmware didn't help). No, I didn't call Sony support - after doing some google research on Sony products in general and other user experiences with the 710 and 720 in particular, I saved my time and frustration and bought an Iomega. I am not happy about the number of (expensive) DL media coasters it's created. I'll never buy another Sony product.

After installing this drive in my case, whenever the drive was in use, my hard drive light would constantly stay lit. The drive itself seemed to work fine, but the light staying on annoyed me so I took it back and bought a Pioneer DVR-A09XL which works wonderfully. Also, the tray ejection motor sounded really weak, as if it could barely push the tray out.