First off, I formatted my drive and installed everything from fresh. I am using 2 discs for this test. Firstly, my Battlefield 2 Special edition. This is a newish disc with little surface damage. Secondly, a 2 speed DVDRW. This is very old and the surface had some nasty marks and scratches.  This had some old back up files on it that I coould delete in a wipe test later. 

I used Nero CD-DVD Speed for this test and this is included in Nero 6.6.0.8.  Now as you can see from Nero Info, there are no Parallel IDE devices.

So on to the tests. Using Nero CD-DVD Speed I inserted the Battlefield 2 Special edition first, and ran the benchmark.

Now the access time mentioned in the specs say "Access Time 160 ms (DVD)" Looks like the average is correct, roughly. What I suggest you do at this point, is to insert a similar sized DVD ROM and test. This way you can compare the results for your self. The computer spec my differ, but generally it will give a good indication of the performance differences.

Next, the dodgy DVDRW.

This is a slightly different story. Though the drive has a smooth curve, it is much slower. This is showing the drives ability to read a poor quality disc, which it seemed to do quite well. Again, insert a similar sized DVD ROM and test. This way you can compare the results for your self.

The computer spec my differ, but generally it will give a good indication of the performance differences.

Conclusion.

I really didn't know what to expect. I was thinking that maybe the SATA bus may give a slight boost and that the whole install turn around time would be quicker. I am not sure. The results are good, but the day to day usage of the drive is strange. It’s not the most convincing leap into SATA DVDRW drives.

I must say though, it does seem to have different characteristics than a parallel IDE device. This may suit you better, it seems to be ok for me just now. 

Pros:

• Getting rid of an old technology
• Cheap 

Cons:

• Not the most convincing of performance changes 

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