DVD Burner Round-up

Julio writes "Gone are the days of storage floppies and zip drives... CD-RW drives do an excellent job in making cheap backups and just about every new computer is equipped with one. As computers and software evolve, so will media. DVD burner drives are already optional equipment on many computers, and will probably become a standard within the next year. Are you ready for a DVD burner? TechSpot has posted a round-up of flagship DVD recorders from Plextor, Panasonic and Pioneer."

Comments

Where is SONY?

[ncl2fth]

That's all thats gets me.. The best DVD burner out there is the Sony DVD+-RW 4x..

Re:Not Buying One Yet

[VivianC]

-- not until all the standards crap settles down and I know what I get wont be useless 2 months later.

That is why I picked up the Sony DRU500XUL which reads and burns DVD +/- R-RW. No matter what the standard settles on, I can already do it.

This is the /. week to like Sony, right?

Re:CDBurners not the end for high-capacity Zip dri

[leshert]

Not only that, but the prices are coming down quickly, and the capacities are increasing almost as fast--you can get 2GB keychains now.

USB keychain drives are in that silly pricing phase right now where you can pay more for a 32MB model than a 128MB model if you're not careful (the local Walmart had a 128MB model last week for $40.00). High-capacity IDE hard drives went through the same thing.

I think keychain USB drives are going to be a real sleeper hit.

Re:NEC 1100A

[macrom]

My neighbor picked up one of these and has loved it. The noise output isn't too bad, either. But one thing I'm surprised at is the lack of a review of the Sony DRU* drives. CD Freaks forum members praise this drive over and over, especially since it burns both +R[W] and -R[W] discs. The price isn't too outrageous anymore for a solid drive that burns most any type of media. We burn hundreds of DVDs each week here at the office with little or no problem on our Sony.

My Experiences

[Gailin]

I bought the Pioneer DVR-A05 dvd-r/rw burner. I must say that I love it! I, like a lot of people, have a home file server that I share all my files and music from. I had been making periodic backups onto other hard drives, but have found it be cumbersome and expensive. In an afternoon I was able to back up my server and all other important information onto dvd-r's and save a lot of money to boot.

If you shop around for media, you can find blanks pretty cheap. I think the ones I'm using now cost 1.26 a piece, which is much cheaper than hard drives.

As for movies, I bought my dvd player and burner around the same to time to ensure compatibility. I also have found that ALL of my friends home DVD players can play movies that I have recorded. And I think it would be fair to say, that most of the players have been purchased within the last two years. Of course, your experiences may vary, I have just had great luck with dvd-r/rw.

G

Re:NEC 1100A

[stratjakt]

The latest in pioneer's venerable DVR-A0x series, the DVR-A06 also does +R/W as well as -R/W.

A quick jaunt around the folks who know the most about media duplication (PS2 and Xbox sceners) tells me this is the machine to own. -R for all your PS2/Xbox "legitimate backups" and +R for all your cheap archiving.

Re:Not Buying One Yet

[stratjakt]

Pioneers DVR-A06 (106 for the OEM crowd) does both too. And is cheaper. And judging by the fanaticism of pioneer owners, probably better. This is what I'd buy if I had the cash.

Pioneer makes great DVD gear in general. I love their slot loading DVD drives.

Plextor will soon come with a new 8x drive!

[pointwood]

If possible, I would wait until that hits the marked: Plextor PX-708A

Iomega will sell a DVD burner with ALL formats

[Steeltoe]

DVD-RAM may be crap, but if you REALLY want it all you've got to wait for the Iomega Super DVD All Format 4X

Re:Fragile Media

[Mongr]

BZZZZT. Verbatim manufactures their own media, so its of known good quality. This is the brand the previous poster was referring to being sold at Sams's Club too. Good stuff.

DVD+R(W) is better than DVD-R(W)

[bluegreenone]

or so i read. An article sheds some light on the whole format war (hint: the title is "Why DVD+R(W) is superior to DVD-R(W)"). From what I've read DVD+RW is the better format technically; as to why read the article.

Some other helpful sites:
Unofficial DVD+RW site
linux dvd+rw info and tools

Some choice quotes from linux info page:

The key feature of DVD+RW/+R media is high [spatial] frequency wobbled [pre-]groove with addressing information modulated into it. This makes it possible to resume interrupted [or deliberately suspended] burning process with accuracy high enough for DVD[-ROM] player not to "notice" anything at playback time. Recovery from buffer underrun condition in DVD-RW/-R case in turn is way less accurate procedure...

As already mentioned, DVD+ groove has "addressing information modulated into it," ADIP (ADress In Pre-groove). This gives you an advantage of writing DVD+RW in truly arbitrary order, even to virgin surface and practically instantly (after ~40 seconds long initial format procedure). In addition, DVD+RW can be conveniently written to with 2KB granularity(***). DVD-RW in turn can only be overwritten in arbitrary order. Meaning that it either has to be completely formatted first (it takes an hour to format 1x media), or initially written to in a sequential manner...