Sony DW-D22A

This drive’s features are recognizable, too. Like many other optical drives selling under the Sony brand, this device is a third-party product, namely the SOHW-1633S model from Lite-On. There’s only an eject button with rounded corners and a LED indicator under the tray on the ivory-colored front panel of the drive; a headphones socket is unavailable. The three symbols denote the class of the device. At the rear panel of the drive, there are interface and power connectors, digital and analog audio outputs, and two jumper blocks (one jumper is for factory diagnostics purposes). The device has a “shortened?design, so it can easily fit into smaller system cases.

The max read speeds of the drive are 48x with CD-ROM and 16x with DVD-ROM discs. The drive can perform burning at the following max speeds: 48x CD-R, 24x CD-RW, 16x DVD+R, 8x DVD+R, 2.4x DVD+R9, 4x DVD±RW. The size of the cache buffer is 2MB; the access time is 135 milliseconds with CDs and 140 milliseconds with DVDs. The drive supports the following media formats: DVD single/dual layer, DVD-R ( 3.9 GB / 4.7 GB ), DVD-R multi-borders, DVD+R, DVD+R multi-sessions, DVD-RW, DVD+RW, CD-DA, CD-ROM, CD-ROM / XA, Photo-CD, Multi-session, Karaoke-CD, Video-CD, CD-I FMV, CD Extra, CD Plus, CD-R, CD-RW. The E-IDE/ATAPI interface is supported here. The drive can be positioned either horizontally or vertically.

The dimensions of the device are 145 x 170 x 41.3 mm; its weight is less than 900 grams. Being in fact a product from Lite-On, the Sony DW-D22A drive supports Lite-On’s exclusive technologies: SMART_BURN is a buffer underrun protection technology; SMART-X allows to process CD-DA, VCD and DVD discs at the maximum allowable speed; and VAS reduces the level of noise and vibration. Besides that, this optical drive features the innovation we’ve already met in other products from Sony: by default it works with CD media at a reduced speed. It helps to avoid unnecessary noise and to achieve a better reading of the disc in some cases. The default speed of our sample was 40x, but if you want to have the maximum 48x, you should insert the disc and then press and hold the eject button for a few seconds until the indicator blinks twice. When you load another disc, the speed is reset to default.

The manufacturer’s recommended retail price is $84.