Panasonic LF-D 201E

The Panasonic LF-D201 is a SCSI DVD-RAM drive. Mmmm, I hear you say, what a bunch of lovely acronyms, if only I knew what they meant I might actually bother to read this article. Never fear all will be explained.

SCSI is the way in which it connects to your computer, for the pros and cons of this method, e.g. compared to USB, see my opinion on Adaptec’s AVA-2904 SCSI controller card and to a lesser extent my opinion on the Plextor ...
...my opinion on the older Panasonic LF-D103.

Having covered the basics in earlier opinions, I can now (thankfully) focus a bit more on the drive itself.

The main reason you would buy this drive as opposed to the lF-D103 is its capacity. It supports the newer bigger 9.4GB capacity DVD-RAMS. This is a huge amount of storage. Many of you reading this probably have less storage space on your entire computer.

... more

The Panasonic LF-D201 is a SCSI DVD-RAM drive. Mmmm, I hear you say, what a bunch of lovely acronyms, if only I knew what they meant I might actually bother to read this article. Never fear all will be explained.

SCSI is the way in which it connects to your computer, for the pros and cons of this method, e.g. compared to USB, see my opinion on Adaptec’s AVA-2904 SCSI controller card and to a lesser extent my opinion on the Plextor 12/10/32S SCSI cd writer.

DVD-RAM is probably going to be the replacement for cd writers. It has an enormous capacity per DVD disk (up to 9.4 GB) and prices are starting to make it accessible to the likes of you and I. I have also discussed DVD-RAM and its pros and cons more extensively in my opinion on the older Panasonic LF-D103.

Having covered the basics in earlier opinions, I can now (thankfully) focus a bit more on the drive itself.

The main reason you would buy this drive as opposed to the lF-D103 is its capacity. It supports the newer bigger 9.4GB capacity DVD-RAMS. This is a huge amount of storage. Many of you reading this probably have less storage space on your entire computer.

Installation was a doddle whack it in an empty bay, connect to my SCSI card and reboot. Everything works first time, Panasonic (and I suppose Microsoft) doing what they ought to. There is one weird anomaly though, since the drive can handle cds and DVD-RAMs it appears in mycomputer twice, once as a cd drive and once as a removable hard drive. Still it does not seem to cause the pc any problems so I must not grumble too much. The drive can also handle ordinary dvds (properly known as DVD-ROMs) and PD (about which I know zip).

The software is the same poorly translated stuff that I use on its older brother, mainly because we downloaded exactly the same files from Panasonic for both. Aside from the odd clanger in translation, the software is very good. There are many useful utilities; the only real problem is the help files, which are rubbish. For example, you can format the DVD-RAMs about six different ways and no real explanation of the pros and cons is given. There is also a bit of an anomaly if you stick an unformatted DVD-RAM in the drive and try to read it, windows will recognise that you have inserted an unformatted disk and offer to format it. DO NOT SAY YES! Windows cannot format the disks (you need to use the utilities provided) trying to use windows to format the disks may upset your computer horribly.

Physically the drive has changed very little, the bizarre loading tray, which I mentioned in my previous opinion on the LF-D103, has been replaced by a more conventional tray which to my eyes looks a tad flimsy. The read write/speed, which I regard as being a bit slow, also remains unchanged.

In summary, this is pretty much the same drive as the LF-D103, but importantly it can take the newer larger capacity DVD-RAMS.

Use the address below to find out more from Panasonic.

http://www.panasonic.com/office/templates/PDIC_BuyNow.asp?Category=1052&ModelNo=lf-d201u
 

...less