DVD Recording - Is There a Winner Yet?

Rob writes "Ok, so I've finally gotten my TiVo configured to let me extract and archive video, now I'm wondering what is my best solution? I currently have a CDR that I've been able to use to save both VCD and SVCD. Unfortunately I have a very old DVD player that will only play VCD's. So I decided that it's time to look at recording to DVD, but what is the right answer? Has any format won? I just got back from Fry's and I could get either -R/-RW or +R/+RW and there were even drives that did all of the formats. This is all well and good, since I'll have to buy a new DVD player to play any of them, but which format is most widely accepted? Even if I get a drive that will record in any format what do most DVD players accept? Sure I can make sure that my DVD player will play whatever format I produce but what about my parents and friends?"

Comments

I prefer +R

[Sheetrock]

Although the formats are very similar, I've heard only positive things about +R/+RW (and mostly negative about -R/-RW). As far as compatibility, either will fit into all standard DVD players, however I've noticed that +R media fits better into -R players! (+R players almost seem to push it out of the drive.)

You can find more information and even user testimonials here.

When in doubt...

[FosterKanig]

...record in BetaMax!

Re:When in doubt...

[PD]

I agree completely, except VHS is even better. Just like all the best sound equipment uses the one best format (vinyl albums) the best video uses VHS tapes. Do an experiment: watch a movie side by side, on the left VHS and on the right a DVD. You'll see that the movie on VHS has many subtle nuances that make the movie seem more alive, not "flat" like the DVD. Experienced movie viewers will only insist on a VHS tape because it provides that three dimensional quality to the sound AND the video, and the digital copy just looks cold to human perception.

And the best thing is that the very best VHS players can be purchased from high end German audio/video companies for just over $10,000 (*). Nothing is too good for your hi-fi home theater!

(*) - The high end VHS players are sold without the special video pickup, which for a good helical scan pickup will be a relatively inexpensive $700 or so.

Re:When in doubt...

[An Ominous Cow Erred]

Actually, as funny as this post is, there really *IS* a semi-superior analog alternative to DVD -- Laserdisc. Laserdisc has twice the vertical chromatic spatial resolution and has no spatial quantization artifacts...

The downsides are Laserdisc has Y/C crosstalk (which can mostly be eliminated by an adaptive interframe comb filter) and it has poorer chromatic dynamic resolution at extreme red and blue...

The end result is that programming that's mastered for NTSC (i.e. television shows, straight-to-video stuff, or stuff that simply doesn't have a film print still in existence) looks better on Laserdisc... and for 24fps progressive source, stuff looks even better on PAL laserdisc (albeit sped up to 25fps so you need a tuned system to slow it back down to 24 to make the voices pitched down a bit and the time to come out right).

DVD only wins out on widescreen stuff thanks to anamorphic support (there were a few anamorphic LDs made but not many were made because they wouldn't work right on non 16:9 TVs since autoscaling was not a feature of LD players). The other big advantage of DVD is that a relatively cheap DVD player ($50 now, unbelieveable!) can produce video that's not too far off from expensive decks, while with LD to get great results you needed a deck that cost at least $500.

Still, I love my laserdiscs. They have great quality, and are still the only way to watch the original Star Wars trilogy in high quality video. (Any DVDs of the original trilogy you might've seen are bootlegs made in SE Asia, mastered from the LDs, so they have all the flaws of LD with all the flaws of DVD put on top of it and are therefore inferior).

Re:Life story!

[metamechanical]

Wow, remind me never to cross you. Looking at me might take up too much of your precious time.

On second thought, I wish I knew you, just so I could give you Dickens for your birthday and watch you cry.