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CD-RW drives with IDE interface
(part VI):
Yamaha CRW2100E



Basic claimed characteristics of Yamaha CRW2100E
Firmware version: 1.00D
Loading mechanism: Tray
Recording modes: Disc-At-Once, Track-At-Once, Session-At-Once, MultiSession, Packet Writing
Recording formats: CD-DA, CD-ROM, CD-ROM XA, CD-I, CD-Digital, CD-Bridge, Audio CD, CD Text, CD-Extra, Video CD
Read/write support in Raw-mode RAW-DAO - not supported
RAW-SAO - supported
RAW-SAO Simulation - supported
Average access time: 160 ms
CD-R recording 1x, 2x, 4x, 8x, 12x, 16x
CD-RW recording 2x, 4x, 8x, 10x
Reading 40x max (6000 KBytes/s)
Buffer size: 8192 KBytes
Production date: October 2000
Manufacturer: Malaysia
Price at the moment of testing: 220 - 230 USD

OEM set includes:

  • Thick user's manual in 4 languages
  • One CD-R and one CD-RW discs.

ATIP: 97m 34s 21f
Disc Manufacturer: Mitsubishi Chemicals Corp.
Assumed Dye type: Cyanine (Type 1)
Media type: CD-Recordable
Recording Speeds: min. unknown - max. unknown
nominal Capacity: 656.40 MBytes (74m 43s 00f / LBA: 336075)

ATIP: 97m 34s 23f
Disc Manufacturer: Mitsubishi Chemicals Corp.
Assumed Dye type: Cyanine (Type 3)
Media type: CD-ReWritable
Recording Speeds: min. 4X - max. 8X
nominal Capacity: 656.40 MBytes (74m 43s 00f / LBA: 336075)

Note that far not every recorder in OEM package will be supplied with a user's manual or/and discs. It can be explained by the fact that many OEM deliveries of Yamaha recorders are completed with one-two complete sets (software, discs and user's manual) per box.

The design of the CD-RW Yamaha CRW2100E is very similar to the earlier models. The distinguishing feature is a writing "16 10 40" and only one indicator.

So, there you can find: headphones jack, mechanical volume control, open button and emergency ejection hole. The drive can be installed only in horizontal position, since there are no any spring clamps.

The tray moves quickly slowing down to the end.

While reading discs the drives makes a lot of hissing rattling noise what reminds me of old CD-ROM drives from BTC. Spindown time set by default is too high; and you can't help it without utilities of the third manufacturers that allow decreasing this interval.

Beside the high noise we noticed a strange work of the drive in DMA mode. When setting "DMA" in the system properties one of the recorders after the suggested rebooting just kept throwing out this sign. As to the other sample, it behaved better: when setting support for DMA, the drive passed all CD WinBench tests with the corresponding low results of CPU utilization, but with the first attempt of track extracting from an audio CD the Windows buzzed dead. The first idea was that the drive refused working with exactly that motherboard - ASUSTeK K7M, or even with the band "disc controller from VIA and chipset of AMD", and we tried the drives on a Gigabyte motherboard based on the Intel 440LX chipset with the Pentium II 233 CPU. The result was the same… After that we installed it in the computer based on the ASUSTeK A7V motherboard and the AMD Athlon 750 processor. And … it worked! The recorders started working in DMA mode, though very unstable - the extracted tracks contained a lot of errors, and sometimes when reading a large file there appeared a reading error, though there wasn't such with other drives. Therefore, we carried out the majority of the tests with DMA disabled (on the same test system with the ASUSTeK K7M mainboard).

Overburn CD-R Philips Silver on these drives gained 2 min. 27 sec. (77:10.32), CD-R Mirex Pro - 2 min. 40 sec (77:23.29).

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