You see, the firmware of the DVD writer contains information, so called media codes, that tell the writer how it has to handle the media inserted. This includes reading and writing speed. If media are not stored in the firmware the default read and write speed will be used which is always slower than what it could be.

Media Code Speed Edit is a software that reads the firmware of a DVD writer and displays the current list of supported media. It can also modify entries and replace entries. Supported are many DVD writers from companies like LiteOn, LG, Pioneer, NEC, Philips, HP and Benq.

The first thing you need to do after starting Media Code Speed Edit is to load a firmware file. You need that file locally which means that you have to either visit the manufacturers homepage and search for a firmware for your device or visit a website like the firmware page to grab an already modified one. Once you have done that you will see a screen that looks like the one below.

Media Type, name and write speed are displayed in a large list. Media Type is the type of the media, e.g. DVD+R9, DVD+R aso. The name is the media identifier used by the manufacturer and the write speed is the max write speed available for that media on your computer.

We do have two possibilities now. We can change settings immediately if that feature is supported in the firmware by selecting a line in the list and changing the speeds or we can use a program like DVD identifier to identify the media that we are using and replace a line that we are not using with the new media.

Open DVD Identifier and click on Options > Clipboard and activate Attach ‘Media Code’ Block. Now put the media in your DVD drive and click on Identify. The DVD will be identified which takes a few moments. Click on Clipboard to copy the results to the clipboard.

Now open Media Code Speed Edit again and select an unused media code. Make sure that it is of the same media type, e.g. replace a DVD+R with a DVD+R code. Once the line is selected click on Import on the left and paste the contents of the clipboard into the form. Click on OK and you are done.

Once you are done click on Save to save the firmware and patch your DVD writer afterwards with the new firmware. Reboot your computer and test if the changes had a positive effect.

This are lots of information at once. A good place to get started are the forum threads discussing DVD writers of several manufacturers which tell you what can be done and what can’t be done. Below are some forum threads to get you started.

Media Code Speed Edit
BenQ / Philips discussion / results
LG discussion / results
NEC discussion / results
Pioneer discussion / results

This surely sounds nice because it increases user-friendliness. Most users do not like passwords at all because they have to memorize them to make them effective. With face recognition this would not be a problem anymore because they would only have to smile into the webcam to start the operating system of their notebook.

It remains to be seen how secure the system is. It would not be a great system if someone would for instance get access by using a high quality picture of the person who uses his face to access the notebook. I don’t think that this technology will become mainstream one day.

The NEC Lavie C Series will come out this September in Japan. Notebook stats for the top range model are 1 Gigabyte of Ram, Core Duo 2 T7500 processor, Blue-Ray Read-only drive, a 160 Gigabyte hybrid hard drive (256 MB flash memory) and a 15.4″ LCD screen with WXGA+.