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Dell Throws In For The +R/+RW Standard
srothroc writes "Dell has been selling DVD+R burners for a while, but now they're tossing them in on free deals with some decent everyday consumer systems. I wonder if this increased support from one of two companies to pull a profit on PCs is going to tip the scale towards the +R format... If not, what's going to happen to the Dell users who have all of these +R drives if it turns out that -R wins out in the long run?"
Dude, you're getting screwed.
True story.
Just like there were two CD-R and CD-RW "standards" that were argued over, a third standard emerged to replace them both. I imagine this is probably what is going to happen here.
Funny how history repeats itself like that.
[insert witty comment here]
Dell threw in a free DVD+RW upgrade on my Inspiron 600m laptop that I bought this June.
If not, what's going to happen to the Dell users who have all of these +R drives if it turns out that -R wins out in the long run?
Fuck 'em. My friend never got reimbursed for his choice of a Bernoulli drive, and that was a lot more than 100 bucks down the drain.
Sometimes you bet on the wrong horse. It happens.
--saint
DVDs will forever READ both +R and -R. If -R were to win right now, in 1-2 years you wouldn't be able to buy DVD+R discs. That means you'd have to buy a new drive. That's not unreasonable for 1-2 years.
If you are out to describe the truth, leave elegance to the tailor - Albert Einstein
As unfortunate as that is. +R media tends to be slightly cheaper for some reason, but -R is the more compatible of the two formats. Regardless there are lots of dual-format drives being made and sold at quite reasonable prices these days, so there is no real danger that +R will disappear any time soon, though it probably should.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
More to the point, I believe the concern is about obtaining +R media should -R win the 'battle' I have used many removeable storage devices in the past, and when the 'newer-better-faster' item comes out, the media becomes scarce and expensive (should you even be able to get it at all.)
--- You are unique, just like everyone else...
I get the feeling the world will move on to the next major jump in burning capacity, and probably another format war, rather than actually settle on +R or -R. Unless the industry as a whole decides on one format or the other, and decides to leave a whole section of consumers out in the cold, neither format will "win."
Someday, you're going to die. Get over it.
I can't believe this. Someone links to a Dell ad for a free DVD burner, and now all of a sudden, "it's a shift in the industry". What the fuck, April Fool's isn't for another few months!
This is minor. The real question is which DVD-HD format will become the standard. It looks like we're going to have 2 incompatible formats introduced the US, with a 3rd format introduced in China.
I don't see why they don't just do what Apple does. Slap in a DVD-/+RW drive and just don't tell anyone. Add support to the OS and again, tell no one. Then when someone complains it's not there tell them but make sure they tell no one.
If you have a mac running panther you can see if your DVD drive supports whatever format by typing drutil info in the terminal. OS X does not support packet writing, sadly.
P.S. drutil stands for DiscRecording Utility
I am curious if there is a huge difference in the cost of the blank media. I have seen wildly fluctuating prices with the cheapest being about $0.75 for a blank DVD. Thoughts on this? Will this be a factor?
dvd+r is the winner my friends.
You already can do dvd+r at 8 speed. I still await
8speed dvd-r.
And around April expect dvd+rDL, that will be dual
layers at over 8gb, that also will be READABLE by
anything that can read dvd+r.
And further, its rumored that some of better dvd+r
8 speed drives will be able to burn dvd+rDL with a
firmware update (afterall, thats what Philips
research team did for their tests).
enjoy living in your dvd-r world...
It's easy to figure out which will win the battle. The one that is technically superior will lose.
How long has then "battle" been going on now? I don't see either giong away anytime soon and only after they are replaced by a new disc or medium. They will both sit around and when 1 goes so does the other. In the mean time, the combo drives that burn either format will dominate as their prices reach the same level as the format specific drives.
The Tools Of Ignorance wanna be a tool?
There really isn't much of a "format war" going on. Most DVD devices support both formats without any problem. The rewrite media is a little less compatible but that is to be expected. Besides any new DVD burner supports both formats anyways.
Whoever posted this should be flogged!
The past is just the present only older -me-
All single-format recorders, such as +RW drives, are effectively end-of-line items, so Dell can buy up inventories at knock-down prices. If they could have got -RW at a buck cheaper, they'd have gone that way, there is no other reason! Jolyon
Please read my Canon EOS tech blog at http://www.everyothershot.com
It really doesn't. There are enough shipped DVD-R and DVD+R drives out there in the world now that you'll be able to buy media for the foreseeable computing future for either. There are enough of each out there now that your current burned DVD's will be readable forever, or at least as long at 5 inch polycarbonate disks are in use. Even the VHS/Beta battle that started 30 years ago and was, for all intents and purposes, over 20 years ago (see http://www.urbanlegends.com/products/beta_vs_vhs.h tml ) doesn't keep me from buying new blank Beta videotapes. They aren't available at Walgreen's, but can be had at larger electronics stores still. The same will be true of DVD-R and DVD+R.
Can you imagine the computing landscape 30 years from now? VHS hasn't changed in that many years, but 30 years ago in the computing field is ancient, ancient history - punched cards, hard-sectored 8 inch 256KB floppies, removable disk packs, and memory capacities that didn't need to be abbreviated to be readable. The likelihood that you'll care about your DVD?Rs at that point is pretty darned low. /frank
And the worms ate into his brain.
Well, I have a spot for the obsolete +R drives between my DC2120 tape drive and my zip drive.
what's going to happen to the Dell users who have all of these +R drives if it turns out that -R wins out in the long run?
1. Ship incompatible hardware for free.
2. Sell the compatible hardware for inflated prices.
3. Profit!
Seriously, Dell sells systems cheaply, but they heavily inflate their prices for components. If they can get people to enjoy the idea of burning DVDs by giving them DVD+R drives, they'll make lots of money when those customers realize that they really need to get DVD-R drives.
Tarsnap: Online backups for the truly paranoid
Most of the drives I see these days support both +r/rw and -r/rw, so it is going to be pretty much a non-issue. Besides, you can generally read the other format on the other type of drive, and most people will be using them for internal use only.
Remember 56k modems. There was US Rebotic's X2, and Rockwells K56Flex. Which one was the winner? V90.
Just because something is the norm doesn't mean it should be acceptable. We're already generating enough waste as a society without this sort of give-away of soon-to-be obsolete technology.
The CB App. What's your 20?
First off, why people don't buy and use more of those multistandard units... it's beyond me. You know, those drives guaranteed to support all formats: -R, -RW, +R, +RW... They're really nice.
:-(
I have a Sony DRU-510 burner, it supports every conceivable format, and works very well.
Second, many units (DVD readers, not writers) that claim that they support only one standard (only -R/RW or only +R/RW) actually do work with the other standard. I don't have exact numbers, but it seems to me that the vast majority of the new drives support de facto all standards. Just try it, you might be suprised.
Then, -R/RW has the advantage of a slightly larger compatibility. There's a lot of slightly older units that, for the majority, support only the "minus" disks.
Every single device that i own and has DVD capabilities is multistandard (knows both "plus" and "minus" disks), however all DVDs that i create for my own purposes are -R, just because of this slightly larger compatibility.
Finally, i wish i had a magic of sorts, to get together all those morons who are responsible for inflicting standard wars on us poor customers. Then i'll only ask to give me, for twenty minutes, a machine gun with lots of ammo. It has to be a model which withstands very long shooting sessions without melting or jamming. After twenty minutes, i'll call you to show you what machine-gun-generated meat pulp looks like.
I'm really pissed off on these stupid issues.
My local Staples (North Seattle) is selling packs of 10 DVD+R from multiple manufacturers for $14.99.
It's by far the cheapest, and most available blank DVD media format on their shelves.
I picked up a pack thinking I'd got a great deal then realized a few hours later it wouldn't work on my Mac G4, did some research, said "duh", and replaced it with DVD-R which does work on my Mac.
While I was there I noticed lots of cheap DVD+R burners on the shelves, and needless to say no Macs for sale, so this is yet another "standards" gone wild deal by the looks of it.
When will this madness end? It's getting as bad as batteries!
Dell, which has been providing DVD+ drives, is now providing DVD+ drives....I wonder if the fact that Dell isn't doing anything different in regards to DVD+ drives will mean anything in regards to DVD+ drives.
One can only hope that any change in the meaning of this non-change will foster a change that may mean no change. Life as we know it could hang in the balance. Please keep us posted on further effects of anything.
Well I NEED to archive my pr0n!!!!!!!!!!!!
-z
If you do, you won't for long.
VHS tapes stored in a typical house might last 10-30 years before they degrade beyond use. See this Google find.
Moving old family videos to DVD is a very reasonable home use for a DVD burner. No, no one NEEDS to save their old VHS tapes. But if people WANT to save their old VHS tapes then they NEED a DVD burner to do it at home.
It doesn't hurt to be nice.
Will we ever have one standard to rule them all?
This is just another non-issue because Dell doesn't give a rip about slashdot users, who are an extremely small percentage of the marketplace. Few people care. The largest single use of a CD/DVD is simply to load programs like your latest TurboTax or Adobe Photo Elements. Someone who really pushes the envelope may use it for backup, but that's a stretch. Who really watches DVDs on their PC? Maybe in a dorm room, but in the real world, unbless you can buy a laptop with a 50 inch screen, people actually have TV sets and a DVD player.
Will all this converge? Sure, in a few years! But since yer average Dell lasts only three years anyway, it doesn't matter. Fry's sold an Internet ready PC (linux) for $99.95 during the holidays. They are a commodity item. People will just by another one. And by then, we'll have new standards to worry about.
"Standards" is an oxymoron.
How about a moderation of -1 pedantic.
No, it'll be whichever one I buy that will lose (Happened with Beta, SyQuest 270, you name it). And since I've got a dual format DVD+/-R/RW you should all be worried...
Not everything that can be measured matters; Not everything that matters can be measured.
This is not BetaMax vs VHS, the media is basically the same, this is simply a format fight.
Writable DVD's are the current new media for data storage and the manufacturers cannot figure where we will be in a year's time? This does not bode well for the long term stability for DVD data storage and needs to be sorted sooner rather than later.
Can someone tell me why competition for formats is a bad thing?
The conventional wisdom seems to be that Beta vs. VHS was bad, but over time the amount of money lost by those who bought into Beta is miniscule, while the competition between the two brought the VHS format into peoples' homes much faster than it would have were there no competitor in the first place.
The same thing happened with DVD: when DivX was introduced, that lit a fire under the pants of the DVD manufacturers to lower prices and market the hell out of their product. I imagine we would not yet have $30 DVD players at WalMart were DivX not to have existed back in 1998.
I for one welcome our new overl...er, a format war. Only the early adopters of the loser formats will lose any money---and by definition, early adopters have money to throw around on uncertainty---while the wider public will benefit. Bring it on.
In this particular case, the war between CD-R(W) and CD+R(W) has brought the prices on both to throw-away levels much more quickly than for CD-R(W), which took over 6 years to get from wide introduction to ultra-cheap).
[ home ]
...or perhaps Dell just overstocked on +R drives and is now trying to liquidate them by throwing them in free as a promo...
If you're going to quote figures from a site, you might as well get it right. According to DVDrHelp here, -Rs have about 92% compatability, while +Rs have about 86% compatability. Hardly a huge difference. Both RW formats sit at 75% compatability.
Well too bad for those who will get stuck with those +RW drives. I predict the demise of +RW in favor of -RW. Why? Well, first of all -RW has greater compatibility. Of course, this is not enough. You must also consider the looming blue laser DVD format rolling out. As with everything, there are two standards-
The Blu-Ray standard is being put forth by Hitachi, LG Electronics, Matsushita Electric Industrial (aka Panasonic), Pioneer, Royal Philips Electronics, Samsung, Sharp, Sony and Thomson Multimedia. Blu-Ray will write and rewrite 27GB per side using a 405nm laser.
NEC and Toshiba put forth their own standard, Advanced Optical Disc,which the DVD Forum has chosen over Blu-Ray. These hold 20GB per side.
I am seeing a lot of conflicting information about whether those numbers are for single layer or not. The people reporting these numbers don't seem to know that a single side has two layers, so I'm reading that AOD can hold anywhere from 20 to 40GB per side. However the consensus seems to be that AOD holds less data than Blu-Ray can, but the advantage of AOD lies in the fact that DVD manufacturers don't have to retool their plants for AOD like they would for Blu-Ray. This is probably one of the larger reasons AOD was accepted by the DVD Forum.
Ok, now after all this babble about next gen DVD, what does this have to do with the subject at hand?
NEITHER of these standards is compatible with DVD+R, and both are backwards compatible with DVD-R. So where are you going to put your data?
-R
HD-DVD IS the standard as proclaimed by the DVD Forum anyway. When HD-DVD is sold in the U.S. and Europe it will be HD-DVD you see in the stores - nothing else. This is what the movie manufacturers agreed on through the DVD Forum.
My prediction is that Blu-Ray will find its niche in backup applications and video production houses. This is due to it's greater production expense (dual head for compatibility as opposed to HD's single lensing) and better media longevity (sealed discs).
Remember Betacam Vs. VHS? It's the same thing all over again. Betacam is STILL the standard in production houses all over the world but it was VHS that ruled the home front.
As for China's weird-ass format, guess what? No one really cares but the Asian markets and media/players/recorders will be made specifically for those markets as needed. Shocking, I know, I know. Proof? The Asian markets have been ignored by Americans before now. Take a look at the popularity of VCD players over there and you'll see what I mean. How many dedicated VCD players have you seen sold/marketed here?
"...Well, there's egg and bacon; egg sausage and bacon; egg and spam; egg bacon and spam; egg bacon sausage and spam..."
For us early adopters even as far back as one year ago could not know that DVD+R would pull ahead, because:
DVD-R was first
DVD-R was cheaper
DVD-R media was cheaper
DVD-R was more compatible
So for at least two years, DVD-R had an advantage. However, given how competition works, are you saying/suggesting DVD-R won't catch up, the way DVD+R did? It's a moot point in that my next system will use whatever standard is most advantageous to me, but I do believe that competition is a good thing, and without DVD-R being there first, DVD+R would not have worked so hard to win; and now that DVD+R has the advantage, this will spur DVD-R manufacturers post haste, I think.
GPL Deconstructed
Correction there - Betacam never competed with VHS. It was Betamax that was in competition with VHS, and no studios ever really used it. Betacam SP is whats used in the studios, and being a high res (>400 lines of resolution) format, recording in component video, it was never intended to be a home video format.
The same people who are scrambling to squeeze the last pennies out of their media catalogs with DRM are the ones screwing up the usability of the media. They never figured out how to standardize audio on a DVD, even though they now distribute audio on DVD in different data formats. And now they're even screwing up the DVD media format, with incompatible DVD-R, +R, and likely more to come. This is what happens when infotainment execs get their competitive paws on the reigns of technology. They don't understand anything except keeping power concentrated in their own boardroom, even when distributing access would make them more money from a unified market. They should just treat all these storage devices are data devices, instead of branding them with a premium, at the expense of compatibility.
--
make install -not war
... software vendor. At least 10 times a day, a customer calls in and the drive doesn't see the media they are using, we ask if they have a Dell machine, they do, and we ask if they're using DVD-R, and they are.
I don't care which one Dell uses, but at least put a big sticker somewhere so the consumers know what they are getting.
DVD-R has stupid stuff like "authoring" vs "general" and so on.
http://www.dvddemystified.com/dvdfaq.html#4.3
DVD-R (which is pronounced "dash R" not "minus R") uses organic dye technology, like CD-R, and is compatible with most DVD drives and players. First-generation capacity was 3.95 billion bytes, later extended to 4.7 billion bytes. Matching the 4.7G capacity of DVD-ROM was crucial for desktop DVD production. In early 2000 the format was split into an "authoring" version and a "general" version. The general version, intended for home use, writes with a cheaper 650-nm laser, the same as DVD-RAM. DVD-R(A) is intended for professional development and uses a 635-nm laser. DVD-R(A) discs are not writable in DVD-R(G) recorders, and vice-versa, but both kinds of discs are readable in most DVD players and drives. The main differences, in addition to recording wavelength, are that DVD-R(G) uses decrementing pre-pit addresses, a pre-stamped (version 1.0) or pre-recorded (version 1.1) control area, CPRM (see 1.11), and allows double-sided discs. A third version for "special authoring," allowing protected movie content to be recorded on DVD-R media, was considered but will probably not happen.
By the time either format is pushed out, dual format CDRW + DVD+/- R drives will probably be $20. By that time, nobody will complain that the free upgrade they got is now obsolete.
BTW, the thing making either format obsolete will probably be some 30GB optical format, not competition from the other version of DVD recording.
what's going to happen to the Dell users who have all of these +R drives if it turns out that -R wins out in the long run?
You wait the two years that it'll take to make them obsolete and then you buy a $19.99 drive (after rebates).
It's just the same as buying a $19.99 CD-RW now when they were $100 a couple of years ago. Prices drop. Does it really matter what you get for free now as you won't be paying current prices for a drive in two years time?
He did say Bloody!
Well, I wouldn't go so far as to make claims that DVD-R can "be read in almost anything". Believe me.... I went through a bunch of hassle trying to make a DVD movie that played back properly on the DVD players I had around here (and the ones my friends and family owned). Just for that limited scope of usage, DVD-R had issues. For one, I had a fairly expensive Toshiba DVD set-top player that didn't seem to work with any recordable media at all. My Playstation 2 would at least attempt to play movies on DVD-R media, but it had problems reading as it got towards the end of almost-full discs. It would begin stuttering and skipping, and usually just freeze up at some point.
I also tried DVD+R though, and it's decidedly LESS compatible than -R for this type of thing. Where +R (and +RW) shine is with a better feature-set and design for working with packet-writing data.
I think the bottom line is, compatibility for *both* formats will only improve as people get rid of their old DVD set-top players and replace them with newer models. Most of the problems lie in what the firmware is capable of that's inside the player siting on someone's TV set.