Plextor Plextor PX-716A

Reviewed by: FDUNN3

Strengths: Works great for the short time it does.

Weaknesses: As this is the second Plextor drive I have owned (and Last) that has burned less than a stack of disks and died just out of warranty I would not recommend anything with Plextor's name on it.

Overall: Plextor was a pioneer in the early days of optical storage and it's name WAS synonymous with quality and reliability but as so many others have done they have probably outsourced everything and their quality assurance is very bad.When you buy Plextor you pay anywhere from 3 to 4 times the cost of barnds with less of a legacy, BUT YOU GET THE SAME WARRANTY. If Plextor thinks their brand is worth paying such a premium for then why do they have such a short warranty.Do yourself a favor just buy a samsung, nec, acer, lite-on or the like. You will get the same warranty and IF your drive goes out in the same short time that the Plextors do then just buy another one. It's like getting a 3-4 year warranty with upgrades. Plextor just stinks and if you buy one then you deserve what you have to go through.

Reviewed by: Donaldronenbaum

Strengths: Good quality CD/DVD burning.

Weaknesses: Breaks easily.

Overall: I have bought several pairs of Plexter CD and DVD burning drives over the last five years. In more than half the cases the drives have failed within one year. I use them carefully and not very heavily. In one instance the tech support made me change media brands several times over the course of weeks, until they finally repaired the drive and admitted that it was faulty. Just recently the drive door on my PX-716A stopped working just four weeks after the warranty expired. Tech support refused to replace the drive. I have installed Sony rewritable drives on computers owned by friends and family. Those drives are all still working properly, and all cost only about half as much as Plextor. Save your money.

Reviewed by: pons5607

Overall: I have a Plextor PX-716A/SW DVD±RW Dual Layer Writer for one year. All worked well until now. The installation was a snap, plug and play at its best. For the prior twelve moth it worked well even with XP's own DVD and CD burning capabilities. However, just as the one year warranty was up, it quit reading any disks at all. I only received the message: drive not accessible, I/O errors. Since I bough my Plextor in Japan, I contacted Plextor via e-mailing on their website but I never received any reply. I have never had such negative experience with a costumer service of any company before. I am surprised since I had previous very good experience with Plextor. I have been using their CD-R PX-W2410A for many years now. I had assumed that Plextor PX-716A/SW DVD±RW Dual Layer Writer would be as good and I would not have any problem. As I noticed, other users seem to have similar problems. There must be a bug in the Plextor PX-716A/SW DVD±RW Dual Layer Writer.

Reviewed by: dickers97

Strengths: Burns anything with the right program.

Weaknesses: Cost more than most

Overall: I've been using my plextor for 8 months without any problems,then while burning a disc, the burner drive "lost" it's mind.Went through all the "self tests", tried all other means to get it working without any results.Finally sent it back to Fletcher,Ohio on 1-12-06 and am presently waiting to see the outcome of it all. Will let all others know just how well Plextor took care of this problem that seems to be all too comon.

Reviewed by: farseer911

Strengths: Great drive, blazing fast.

Weaknesses: second drive, secont time it failed.

Overall: Great drive, however I have had to replace it twice, due to drive failure. Both drives started having initialization errors. However if you write on the paper label of the drive (I do so I know what machine they came out of, date & place of purchase and order number) THEY WILL NOT REPLACE THE DRIVE. THEY SAY YOU HAVE DEFACED THE DRIVE AND ALTERED IT. They will not service the drive that is the end of the story. If does not matter who you call talk to or ask. I spoke with the VP of Operations and received the same story, No I have defaced the drive and they will not replace it. It is also considered defacing or altering the drive if you add another label to it. under the serial number lable They say that that label may have caused the drive to fail. It may have kept in heat or done damage to the drive. Once again They will not service the drive and you are out.So based on this I must give Plextor a 1 star. they just will not service their product regardless and will find a way to get out of it if they would like to. Ohh and the marker that wrote on the first drive is removable, regardless they will not allow resubmissions once they deny the RMA. YOU ARE S.O.L.!!!