hey guys since i bought my 105 earlier on this year i have been exclusively burning at 4x on ritek g04's

I'm starting to get a little more money concious and was thinking about switching to g03's- as i'm not in the mass burning business so i can live with a 2x burn vs a 4x burn although 1x burns tend to annoy a bit as i'm wary of using the pc while burning and an hour away from the pc is a pain if i have other things to do.

The thing is in all the excitement of getting the drive, i flashed the drive with the hacked firmware so i have the 2x4all on the drive almost immediately.

I later regretted the decision what with the concerns voiced on this forum, but i guess i have no way of going back.

What i'd like to know is whether people on here with 105's and i guess 104's as well, DO burn the ritek g03 (1x-2x) at 2x with success?

I think i'm right in saying that official pioneer firmware on both drives only allows the g03 dye to be burned at 1x?

That is correct. While my first 105 was working, it burned at 2x with hacked firmware without a single glitch. However after ending up with a dead drive, I promised that I wouldn't put hacked firmware on my replacement. I know G04s are more expensive but I haven't found that there is that much of a difference. Also I'm not sure about the UK but here in the US the price on 4x Riteks is falling a little about every 2-3 weeks.

well currently cheapest 4x G04 media i can get works out to 88p/disc where as cheapest 1x-2x G03 i can find is 57p/disc

with the run up to xmas i guess the companies can charge what they want as i guess this one of the busiest periods of the year- possibly not- can't see many people being too impressed unwrapping their pressies and finding a dvd-rip in jewel case :D

both the same brand- datasafe- which to my great surprise has been very good (been through about 30 without a problem where as with all the others i tried namely, fws, datawrite (overprints) and even traxdata i've had the odd power calibration related coaster)

As an aside there have been some ritek branded g04 discs that have recently popped here in the uk. any of you guys used it? i assume its got to be top notch for ritek to put their name on it

I have a A04 with 2x4all and I burn G03s at 2x all the time with out a problem. :cool:

Well the Sony one I got burn GO3 at 2x without any hack firmware. Working pretty good so far, as it's fairly new, but save me at least 60 dollar or more on 200 DVD.

Originally posted by nimbles
well currently cheapest 4x G04 media i can get works out to 88p/disc where as cheapest 1x-2x G03 i can find is 57p/disc

with the run up to xmas i guess the companies can charge what they want as i guess this one of the busiest periods of the year- possibly not- can't see many people being too impressed unwrapping their pressies and finding a dvd-rip in jewel case :D

both the same brand- datasafe- which to my great surprise has been very good (been through about 30 without a problem where as with all the others i tried namely, fws, datawrite (overprints) and even traxdata i've had the odd power calibration related coaster)

As an aside there have been some ritek branded g04 discs that have recently popped here in the uk. any of you guys used it? i assume its got to be top notch for ritek to put their name on it

Yes the unbranded Ritek/Ridata discs that are straight from the factory are excellent. These are what I use all of the time.

My old 104 (firmware 1.31) is still going strong and burns G03's at 2 X no problem.

Edit :
Seems a few folk are having probs with the Datasafe G03's ... maybe they're not so cheap at 57p ?? : http://www.cdrom-guide.com/cgi/Ultimate.cgi/showthread.php?s=&threadid=262015

Thanks for the heads up PhilEnfield, i'll see if there are any other 2x G03's around but they do seem to be very thin on the ground

I think they might have stopped production on the G03s. Rima.com no longer even carries the G03s. Several places are completely out of stock of G03s. Who knows. It would help explain why the prices on G04s have been falling pretty rapidly though.

DigitalPromo have a few in stock ...... Neo's at 59p and Arita's at 61p.

I have used Aritas before and can recommend them.

http://www.digitalpromo.co.uk/erol.html