mine reads music cds fine and burns fine with nero as well.  CLV starts at 8x - 24x.  Pretty good too.  Very low cpu usage.

Except for dvdplayback.  With AC power it's fine and fluid at around 35% cpu.  With battery it goes crazy and skippy and stays around 95% cpu load.  Tried w/ both windvd and powerdvd.  I've checked for the index servicing for the drive and it's not listed so i can't even try the trick.  my 8500 is only a week old and i've fresh formatted w/ xp pro w/ all the dell drivers.  Never crashed, been perfect even with games.  prime95 cpu stressed for 8 hrs and memtest memory stress test for 8 hrs.  All perfect.  Now i notice this.  Anyone know of a fix?  I've searched the forums and noticed i'm not alone.  I would hate to send this drive in if it's perfectly fine.  But it's exhibiting this issue so it can't be perfect.  Firmware U102.  I noticed there's a U103 on firmware website but not on samsung's and i read alot of people having dead drives trying to flash it so I'm not going to try.  At least not until Dell releases their driver.  Don't want them to say I screwed it up and not give me an exchange.  Before I try Dell's tech support I figure i'd try here first.  Thanks

fiend

i8500wuxga,crucial512ddr,gf4200go,fujitsu30gig4200rpm,pcmcia802.11b

over-friend,

and what can u say about buffer underrun tecnology? u can see that justlink work?

make a test burning from your HD (no create image firsth of course), start recording and stress your dell opening a lot of application and start defrag

You can see the buffer level that go down to 0% (buffer underrun). You can see also that cdr stop recording for some seconds. If JustLink work, the samsung must finish its copy succesfully.

 

i tried defragging while doing a simulation burn. Nero's buffer has not gone under 95%.  Plus the burner is very slow using CLV method.  So it's going to be almost impossible for me to get justlink to activate.  Are you sure DMA is enabled on your HD and burner?

Bob,

I've ran the diagnostics, and they all passed.
That doesn't mean it actually works properly.
There is no test for CD writing functionality.

Anyway, as to the other stuff.
You'd be hard pressed getting a buffer underrun on the I8500.
And I didn't.

To add to the testing, I've tried different manufacturers CDR discs, and they all failed.
Even tried some CDRW media and it failed as well.
All tests are burning images (ISO, BIN/CUE).

I've contacted Dell, and they've arranged a swap for my drive.
We'll see how it goes.

I try the u103 firmware but it remove the udma 2 support..... and did not improve on burning, so I just flash it back to U102. I have difficulty on buring iso but avi files burnt well..... wonder if the drive is defective or not

The drive works fine when one creates a 'data cd' in Nero.
The only (writing) problem is images. This probably has something to do with faulty DAO/SAO support.

Anyway, I got my new drive today.
Much to my disappointment (and amusement), Dell sent me the same drive. A Samsung 324B.
ARGH!

Same revision, same firmware. Nothing changed.
And it failed.

Oh well.
Surely someone at Dell could get a 8500 with a 324B, and TRY it.
You'll see that it's broken.

Then maybe you could get Samsung to release a firmware update.

Anyway, waiting for my new, new drive.

Same problem here,cant burn bin/cue images.Tried with the included roxio and nero.It will pass during the simulation sometimes and sometimes even complete the burn but its always an empty cd when its done.Even fails when burning music cd's sometimes.This is complete garbage and totally unacceptable.

man! i've had my 8200 since april...and i've been waitin for firmware this entire time! i've had all 3 problems. and now I'm currently out of the country, and my laptop is in storage. GREAT! I'll have to call for a replacement once I get back in a month. ALL THIS TIME! Dell should have been more forecoming with this information...

I also have the 324 B. After reading the messages here I wanted to check and found out that the included Nero software (at least here in germany) is the basic version which explicitly doesn't burn audio and video files... (so it says at the beginning window offering an upgrade (to be paid...)

These drives are horrible, after using mine for 2 weeks it blew, it won't even boot to the diagnostics, prooving it is blown. When I talk to their tech support they are idiots, they can barely speak english and I had 4 of them ask me about reinstalling the cdrom in XP. HELLO!!!!! If it won't boot to a disk it is defective. The kept saying they have to go through their useless troubleshooting steps treating me like I know nothing about computers. I am returning this piece of junk and getting an exchange. It better have a good drive. I am also telling my other friends who wanted to buy a new pc not to buy from dell, and if the new one doesn't work I will return it and go to CompUSA and buy a machine that does.

No kidding. They just replied to my email saying "we're sorry your hard drive is a poor model. Next time we'll do better." who the heck is talking about a hard drive?!?!?

I think it is better to call in...... just as what I did..... the drive just getting worse......it cannot burn data correctly........ wish my replacement will not be a samsung.......

I received my new Panasonic/Matsushita UJDA740 drive today.
I've tested all features, and everything works.
It recognises new discs properly, burns all images properly, and plays DVDs well.
It also makes less rattling noises than the Samsung drive.

Yea you get no results unless you call during normal business hours and get an actual American to answer your call. My Panasonic is on the way, hopefully it works.