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First DVD+R9 Burners Reviewed
Hack Jandy writes "DVD dual-layer burners finally seem ready for the public - today, a review of the Sony DRU-700A was posted by Anandtech, and teasers of the BenQ 830A posted at CDRInfo.com. Unfortunately, the drives seem too slow to to really warrant a purchase."
That would be a strange move on their part considering the following, from the MPAA website:
"The Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) serves its members from its offices in Los Angeles and Washington, D.C. On its board of directors are the Chairmen and Presidents of the seven major producers and distributors of motion picture and television programs in the United States. These members include:
- Buena Vista Pictures Distribution;(The Walt Disney Company)
- Sony Pictures Entertainment Inc.;
- Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc.;
- Paramount Pictures Corporation;
- Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation;
- Universal City Studios LLLP; and
- Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc."
I would think there is at least some communication between the different divisions of Sony.-- Every time you kill a kitten, God masturbates.
Did you read the same article? The first page clearly shows both formats.
The only format it didn't support was DVD-RAM.
Hey Jerkoff... DVD Shrink doesn't just compress, it also allows you to rip out all of the extra shit like "special features", the menus, and French soundtracks so you don't have to compress the movies. And when you DO have to compress (because, say, you want all of the shit on the DVD), then DVD Shrink can do a deep analysis, and make an excellent copy, even with compression. DVD Shrink rocks.
Anyone have any idea when DVD Shrink will be available for DVD-9? I'm waiting for DVD Shrink to support the drives before I buy one.
If they hold a full, uncompressed movie, they're good enough.
Frame size: 720 x 576
Frame rate: 30 fps
Chroma subsampling: 1.5 (assuming YUV 4:2:0)
Duration: 90 mins
720*576*30*1.5*90*60 / (1024^3)= 93.9 GiB
Conclusion: these discs don't have anywhere near the capacity to hold an uncompressed film. In addition, the drive could not read data off the disc fast enough for real-time playback (max speed was quoted at 16620 KB/s)
Lossless video codecs can get you a ratio of around 10:1 though, so that's a possibility.
You can now. That's what dual layer disks give you.
Stamped DVDs can be single (4 gig and a bit) or dual layer (9 gig and a bit)
Until these drives came out, writable media was only single layer - so 'only' 4 gig.
Depends on the burner.
Writing needs more laser power than reading - so some drives may only be able to focus the read laser onto the second layer.
Another thing to consider is focus blur - when reading the laser also shines unfocussed on the outer layer, it doesn't matter much. But when writing you have to be careful not to apply too much power to the layer you don't want to write to, or you'll end up writing stuff that you don't want.
Finally though - yes, for many drives it is just a firmware upgrade. That is DEFINATELY the case for the BENQ drive. Any 12x/16x drive using that chipset can be upgraded to dual layer with a firmware patch.
Whether they will sell you this patch is another matter - but I know Benq were nice about putting the patch for minues writing out there.
A few things:
1. DVD-/+RW drives, dont need to spin the discs as fast, they can read more data, even spinning at slower speeds, due to how the data is compacted on the surface of the disc.
2. Multiple heads and tracks have already been discussed in many a "look a new harddrive" thread, all ended the same, it's too hard (ie. expensive) to syncronize the writing, you could not get coherent data, unless maybe you wanted to consider it as disc partitions, you can have 4gig here, and 4 gig here, but no 8gig files.
3. If you're looking for fast, large mass storage, and dont care if other drives can read them, get a tape drive, until then, backwards compatability is important, I can get a 16x DVD drive for around $30 CAD, it can read (At least) DVD-9's, if changing to a four head writer means all existing DVD drives and DVD Players are obsolete, it's not gonna happen, especially since a 4x head writer would probably cost five times as much (no, not 4x as much) as a regular one.
4. Whats the big hurry to write DVD's?! thats a pantload of data, take the time and do it right!
seriously though, knowing it's going to take a 1/2 hour to an hour to burn a CD (or dvd, I'm going by past experience here though) has made me consider much more carefully what data goes on, as opposed to "andddddddd DONE... oh... SH!T, I forgot this one".
I believe Pioneer said a few months ago that they tested the A06 using new firmware and got it to burn onto dual layered DVD-R media.
Furthermore, the Anandtech article did state that they managed to convert a GO-W0808A to burn DVD+R9's:
"In fact, several other MT1818E burners are capable of firmware upgrades to DVD+R9. In fact, using beta firmware upgrades, we actually got our Gigabyte GO-W0808A to burn DVD+R9 as well. Keep in mind that the GO-W0808A retails for less than $110, while the DRU-700A will hit shelves at $199. Although the Sony DRU-700A is a considerable step up from the DRU-530A, we would have to recommend the GO-W0808A if it costs $90 less and performs the same." - AnandTech
The 'teaser' linked to in the article predicts an initial price of $5 to $8 per disc. No word on availability, but one could assume they will hit the stores at about the same time as the drives.
5) This still won't hold a standard Movie DVD.
DVD Shrink
- (sorry, windows only app.)
Or Rip them to DivX and use one of These to save even more time/space! I am! =D
You just calculated the figures for 24-bit RGB. As I said in my original post, I was assuming YUV 420 - as this is the most common format for uncompressed video.
In this example the Y (luma) component is 720x576, but the U and V (chroma) components are subsambpled to 352x288 each. This results in half the amount of raw data versus 24-bit RGB at virtually no loss in perceived quality.
8,547,991,552 bytes (7.96GB) less the overhead of your file system of choice.
Sony DL Info
DVD Formats
Disc Max User Capacity Note :DVD5 4.7GB Single layer Single sided disc
:DVD9 8.5GB Double layer Single sided disc
:DVD10 9.4GB Single layer Double sided disc
:DVD18 17.1GB Double layer Double sided disc
:DVD-R 4.7 GB Single layer Single sided disc
:DVD-RW 4.7 GB Single layer Single sided disc
:DVD+RW 4.7 GB Single layer Single sided disc
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TKM