Liteon LH20A1H DVD Writer Review

I bought LiteOn LH20A1H LightScribe enabled drive yesterday which cost me 2.2k. Now I can use the DVD-R DL that’s been lying around on my desk. The reason its still on my desk is because my old BenQ DW1620 writer does not support DVD-R DL.

Anyways I was disappointed not to find LightScribe labeling software bundled with the drive, just Nero 7 Essentials. I tried to find LightScribe configs in Nero 7 Ultra Edition but failed to do so. I found the 'burn label' option under Extras but it was grayed out. Also, I tried NeroCover Designer, and could find the LightScribe option under File -> Preferences as the last Tab but no drives were listed.

My search took me to www.lightscribe.com where I downloaded LightScribe system software version 1.10.16.1, which was around 9MB. After installing this update, I fired up the LightScribe control panel which was sitting conveniently on my system tray. The drive was detected under system information. Now that the LS system software was in place, I thought I will give Nero another go, but again NeroCover Designer was not able to list the drive.

I needed a labeling tool to use the hardware and software combo. Browsing through a few forums, I found that Nero8, Surething 4 and Roxio had support for LightScribe. Since I had none of them, my search again pointed me to www.lightscribe.com. There I found LightScribe Template labeler (30MB). After downloading and installing, I found some good basic templates.

Now that I had the hardware, driver and the necessary software installed, I needed to figure out what I wanted to burn. I had some data which I wanted to back up, but finally decided to burn Fawlty Towers (all 12 Episodes) since I would also need to LS the disc. The total size was 2.2 Gig, too much free space wasted, but again I did not have anything else to burn. Anyways my first CD also did not have data burned up to its brim.

Searching for images on google got me a few good pictures for Fawlty Towers. Customizing the templates in LS Template labeler was fairly easy. Just select the images and customize your text. Now, everything was in place, the disc was burned, driver in place, template ready. I flipped the disc, inserted it and hit the print button. It took around 23 minutes to complete the print. Here is the picture.

I know it’s not a good quality picture but hey, I am using my Nokia 6630 to capture it. Here is the drives configuration.

Cache Size: 2 MB

DVD+R Write Speed: 20x
DVD+RW Rewrite Speed: 8X
DVD-R Write Speed: 20x
DVD-RW Rewrite Speed: 6x
DVD Read Speed: 16x
DVD-RAM Write Speed: 12x
DVD Access Time: 160 ms
CD Write Speed: 48x
CD Rewrite Speed: 24x
CD Read Speed: 48x
CD Access Time: 160 ms
Color: Beige, Black
Length: 6.6"
Width: 5.7"
Height: 1.62"
Weight: 1.9 lbs.
Load Type: Tray
Interface Type: E-IDE / ATAPI
Enclosure Type: Internal
Compatible Writable Media:
CD-R
CD-RW
DVD+R
DVD-RAM
DVD-RW
DVD+RW
DVD-R
DVD+R DL
DVD-R DL

Writing Modes:
Disc-at-Once
Fixed and Variable Packet Writing
Raw writing
Session-at-Once
Track-at-Once
Over-Burn

Supported Formats:
CD-DA
CD-Extra
CD-i/FMV
CD-Plus
CD-R
CD-ROM
CD-ROM XA
CD-RW
DVD Dual layer
DVD single layer
DVD+R
DVD-RW
Karaoke CD
multi-session
Photo CD
DVD+RW
video-cd
Multi Border