Panasonic (Matshita) UJ-845
A lot of people have reported long-term issues with this burner and certain CD/DVD media. While the author of the review has not experienced any problems, you may find your own experience is not acceptable.
A FAQ is available at the Panasonic UJ-845 FAQ page.
Notebooks are not usually big on upgrade potential. The parts are difficult to obtain, are generally more expensive, and people are nervous about opening up an expensive piece of equipment.
One of the few upgrades paths is the optical drive. Typically a notebook will have a CD burner, possibly with DVD reading capabilities. The latest notebooks will undoubtedly contain a DVD burner, but the great majority will be lacking this feature. Enter the Panasonic UJ-845!
Marketed as an OEM drive, the UJ-845 is unlikely to be found in retail stores. However it is easily purchased from any number of websites, and for a surprisingly reasonable cost, especially considering that is dual-layer, slot-loading, and supports DVD-RAM. That’s good going even by desktop standards.
For the purposes of this review, an Acer Travelmate 800 was used as the test notebook, replacing its standard QSI CD-RW/DVD-ROM drive.
Description & capabilities
The drive is a standard 12.7mm notebook unit that should fit most notebooks. It is also suitable for appropriate SFF PCs, and could be used in conjunction with the right housing to provide a slim line external DVD burner.
The official capabilities of the drive are:
- 5X Speed DVD-RAM Writing
- 8X Speed DVD-R Writing
- 4X Speed DVD-RW Writing
- 24X Speed CD-R Writing
- 16X Speed CD-RW Writing
- 8X Speed DVD+R Writing
- 4X Speed DVD+RW Writing
- 24X Speed CD-ROM Reading
- 8X Speed DVD-ROM Reading
- Buffer Under Run Protection
- +R Dual Layer Writing
Nero InfoTool gives the following report on the capabilities of the drive:
| Drive: | MATSHITA DVD-RAM UJ-845S |
|---|---|
| Type: | DVD-RAM Recorder |
| Firmware Version: | D100 |
| Buffer Size: | 2 MB |
| Date: | 01-11-05 |
| Location: | 1:0 |
| Read Speed: | 6.0 X |
| Write Speed: | 4.0 , 2.4 X |
| Read CD Text: | Yes |
| Return C2 Pointers: | Yes |
| Read CD-R: | Yes |
| Read CD-RW: | Yes |
| Read DVD-ROM: | Yes |
| Read DVD-RAM: | Yes |
| Read DVD-R: | Yes |
| Read DVD-RW: | Yes |
| Read DVD+R: | Yes |
| Read DVD+RW: | Yes |
| Read DVD+R DL: | Yes |
| Read Digital Audio: | Yes |
| Read CD+G: | No |
| Read VideoCD: | Yes |
| Write CD-R: | Yes |
| Write CD-RW: | Yes |
| Write DVD-R: | Yes |
| Write DVD-RW: | Yes |
| Write DVD+R: | Yes |
| Write DVD+RW: | Yes |
| Write DVD+R DL: | Yes |
| Write DVD-RAM: | Yes |
| Buffer Underrun Protection: | Yes |
| Mount Rainier: | No |
| Modes: | Packet, TAO, DAO, SAO, RAW SAO |
| Region Protection Control: | RPC II |
Basically, the drive supports almost every format you could possible want! Note the difference in what Panasonic believe is the drive speed, and what Nero reports.
Comments (page 15 of 15)
Apr 23, 2008 3:16 pm
I am having problems with UJ-841s in my Toshiba M115-s3094 laptop. It does not work most of the time. Funny part is that it used to work when I first got it, burnt about 50 DVDs with no problems and now it does not work at all.
1. The windows has been changed from Media Center to XP, would that cause an issue? It does read all the first set of DVDs I burnt with it but cannot read the DVDs it burns itself lately.
2. What is compatible with this drive? is the UJ-850 really compatible and can be swapped or will it cause Master Slave issues?
I cant pay $199 on eBay for a used UJ-841s I might as well just buy a complete laptop!
Any comments will be appreciated!
Apr 21, 2008 5:43 am
According to Matshita's website, the 845S is an OEM product. Therefore, they do not issue firmware updates for that drive. Any updates come from the computer maker as needed. This explains why Toshiba's firmware is at 200 vs the standard 100. Since these are vendor specific, it doesn't seem like a good idea to install the firmware from another computer maker. This is also likely the reason why the drive seems to support more than is officially recognized and why some vendors may support different options
As for region locking, this is a scheme created by the motion picture industry, not the drive maker. Therefore, since the drive maker or OEM reseller does not want to create ill will with their customers, they can reset the locking counter. While they may state an official limit to the unlocks, it isn't likely that this limit really exists. Remember, the region locking was at the request of the major film studios, the drive makers develop their own locking system, not the studios. There is a limit however, to the drive vendors' willingness to reset the counter. Unless you have a good reason for this and find a helpful service rep. In the case of a company like Acer, that wont reset the counter and suggests buying a new drive, be sure that you are speaking with the appropriate service rep, which is often not the first person that answers the phone or works the sales floor all day. If you are speaking with the appropriate service rep, be sure to inform them that this will weigh HEAVILY when you purchase your next computer
Cheers !
Feb 10, 2008 10:53 am
Dear Support,
I have recently bought a Lenovo Y 500 series of laptop which has internal MATSHITA DVD-RAM UJ-85JS ATA device.
Unknowingly I have changed the region code of this drive to the maximum limited number of times and thus I am now not able to run any DVD for my region.
i shall really be obliged if you Can please let me know of any way through which I could unlock this region code from my DVD drive "MATSHITA DVD-RAM UJ-85JS ATA device".
thanks and regards,
Abhishek kumar
Hyderabad, India
Jan 16, 2008 3:17 am
i have matshita dvd ram uj841S. it can read files but it cannot burn cd or dvd. can you give me driver for this type. thanks.
Dec 28, 2007 4:12 pm
Dear Sir!
I have a Matshita DVD-Ram UJ-830S, but it don't work
now. It need a Driver, but I don't have. Because I
need your help!
Please send me a driver for it or show me the link to
find it! I looked it a lot on Internet but I don't see
any thing about this.
Thanks your help sir!
quoctuan
Dec 16, 2007 4:31 pm
When I Try to Burn in IDVD, massage says (you need a super drive to burn) and I have it (Matshita UJ-85JS) I can't find DVD Rom in my Mac.
Thanks and Happy New Year
Nov 30, 2007 12:30 pm
ok, i have the same problem with my drive (error 11) it wont even recognize it , but its listed under device manager as installed but a hardware issue... now i also dual boot on my pc with linux ubuntu and it works perfectly under linux so now I'm stuck with making ISO's of my cd's then virtual drive them on my windows partition, this may be an issue with windows xp the drivers or something but its definatly not the hardware, it works top notch in linux... who knows when this happened i was angry but when I saw the linux used it perfects I was confused t no end!
as far as a fix I have no idea if the drive company should be the one to fix or Microsoft, either one should be able to fix the problem.
~clayon
Nov 26, 2007 10:57 am
Same problems here with Satellite A100 model, "burn process failed" on cd and dvd. I dont have any solution! How is this possible?
Aug 9, 2007 1:56 pm
I bought a ACER ASPIRE 1692 WLMI, the day i bought it is giving me some problems. Its DVD ram uj-845D was giving problems since begining, but now it even do not recognize cds and dvds, nor can i write: p+l suggest??
Aug 9, 2007 8:41 am
i spent all my regions changes in my uj845d. i cant find the current firmware.
What can i do?
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