LG DVD writers - firmware upgrades rock!
I've got two DVD writers in my PC: an LG GSA-4163B and an LG GSA-4120B. I use DataWrite Titanium DVD+R's. For a long time i've just been accepting a 'coaster' rate of around 20% when using up most of the DVD capacity (4GB+ writes on a single disc). It's a pain in the arse to have to throw away 20 out of 100 DVD's - not for the cost which is peanuts but the time taken to learn that the DVD cannot be verified.
So, today I searched for firmware updates for both DVD writers. I found firmware update A116 for the LG GSA-4120B and firmware update A105 for the LG GSA-4163B. I applied these updates (each firmware update requires a reboot of the PC) and tested a write of a full(ish) DVD on each drive. To my astonishment the DVD was written to much quicker and the verification was executed very quickly as well. There were no errors whatsoever.
So, I guess that the firmware upgrade has fixed some sort of bugs in the DVD writers. If anyone is having problems writing DVD's then it may be worthwhile to update the firmware in the DVD writer itself.