Buffer Size 2 MB Access Time
120 ms Max Transfer Rate 8 MB/Sec Supported Formats
CD-DA, CD-ROM, CD-ROM XA, CD Extra, CD-I, Mixed-Mode CD, Video CID,
PhotoCD, CID TEXT, Bootable CD Recording Modes Disc At Once,
Session At Once, MultiSession, Track At Once, Packet
Writing
Yamaha 6416SZ
6x/4x/16x
Buffer Size 2 MB Access Time
160 ms Max Transfer Rate 2.4 MB/Sec Supported Formats
CD-DA, CD-ROM, CD-ROM XA (both photo CD and Video CD), CD-I, CD-Digital,
CD-Bridge, Audio CD, CD-Extra, Video CD Recording Modes
Disk-at-Once, Session-at-Once, Track-at-Once, Packet Writing, (Variable
and Fixed), Multi-session
As you can see from the above specs, the Ricoh seems to be the faster of the two drives. Yamaha handicap is the 16x reading speed compared to Ricoh's 24x reading speed. Both the drives support the same CD formats as well as recording modes. The one thing that looked funny in the above specs is Ricoh's claimed 8 MB/sec max transfer rate. If you do the math, you will find that Ricoh's 24x reading speed allows only for a 7.2 MB/sec max transfer rate. Let's take a look at the numbers and see if the specs have any truth in them.