DVD Writers

[Krazeh]

Realised how much stuff i've got scattered all over my drives and absolutely no way to back up so i'm looking to buy a dvd writer, what manufacturers should I be looking at and what sorta specs?

 

[Scooba da Bass]

Pioneer 106D.

 

[Whipped]

I've got a Sony drive that cost me £100 a couple of months ago. Never had any probs with it. Plus a quick BIOS flash enable 4 speed write on it.

I'll see if I can track down the model number when I get home.

 

[Yaka]

stay away from the pio 107/a07. i ve had six coasters just but trying to burn some files (mainly me own art werk and the odd word file) on it. and i only got it on monday


oh yeah anyone know wots the best proggies to use for burning mpeg 1, mpeg 2, avi, divx, xvid etc to dvd for playback on standalone players?

 

[Scooba da Bass]

Use TGMPenc to convert to dvd compliant mpegs then your dvd authoring software of choice.

 

[smurkin]

TMPGenc is fnatastic....I love it...& its mostly free (not the mpeg2 converter tho)

As for burners I have this on (back) order

MSI DR8-A 8x DVD±R/±RW (Black) - Retail (CD-009-MS)

£99 inc

It was supposed to be in stock - I've been waiting 2 weeks for it....dont get me started

 

[Whipped]

Got the model number. Sony DRU-500A. As I said, was under £100 and will be billed as a 2X writer, but a BIOS flash will up that to 4X. Had no problems with it so far. Probably 3 duff burns in about 70 burnt DVDs.

 

[jakswan]

Dunno

Pioneer 106 rocked haven't seen 107 yet. Sony is ok bit fussy on media, doesn't like Princo die much although I've heard with BIOS flash it's ok.

Have a NEC 8x ND2500 it's ok, seems pick up time is long though, burns 6x (?) to 4x +R DVD's, thats what Nero says, takes 9mins full 4gb.

Have heard Lite-On's are good but I keep selling em before I have a chance to have a play

Convert AVI's with cucu soft, well it's least painful method and I like it, www.cucusoft.com

MEDIA is important on DVD's, Ritek die all the way.

 

[Yaka]

jak tried the lastest firmware fer your deive? its ment to fix things

 

[xane]

Lite-On are cheap and I've not had problems with them.

 

[MYstIC G]

Ditto xane, my 811S is the nads.

 

[Trem]

stay away from the pio 107/a07. i ve had six coasters just but trying to burn some files (mainly me own art werk and the odd word file) on it. and i only got it on monday


oh yeah anyone know wots the best proggies to use for burning mpeg 1, mpeg 2, avi, divx, xvid etc to dvd for playback on standalone players?

Maybe the discs you are using, I take it you aren't doing it at 8x because that would be crazy!

I got a Pioneer 106 and I still only burn at 2x.

 

[Yaka]

naw got some ritet 8x dvd-r's a lot of peeps are having probs, i can burn pano sonic 4x dvd-r's @ 8x tho. but thats with the un offical firmware. drive seems ok after i installed it

 

[smurkin]

Lite-On are cheap and I've not had problems with them.

I just bought 25 of them on the advice of a bloke at MD...thing is they are "-". Now, "+" is faster I believe & more popular...is that right...did I buy the wrong media? (my burner dose both...but I want compatibilty with my living room DVD player)...

Ta

 

[xane]

My Lite-On is a LDW411S and does both formats, it cost about £90 incl VAT at eBuyer.

 

[Scooba da Bass]

Dvd-r is marginally more compatible but both will play in most things.

 

[smurkin]

I just bought 25 of them on the advice of a bloke at MD...thing is they are "-". Now, "+" is faster I believe & more popular...is that right...did I buy the wrong media? (my burner dose both...but I want compatibilty with my living room DVD player)...

Ta

Ah sorry ...got my knickers in a twist, well my brands...I bought 25 disks...25 DVD writers would be pointless...unless you wanted to build a small wall with them

 

[SoWat]

Lite-On have a good reputation, and I have a CD Recorder from them.

I decided to purchase a DVD Writer (for much the same reasons as yourself) and ended up buying an Optorite DD 0401.

Specs:
DVD +R 8x
DVD -R 4x
DVD+RW 4x
DVD-RW 2x
CDR 40x
CD-RW 24x
HD-BURN 24x

I really like the HD-Burn (High Density Burn) which can cram 1.5Gb of data onto a normal 700mb CDR.

I use both +R and -R blanks. +R are more expensive, but can be written to faster. However, I've found I use the HD-Burn a lot more than I thought I would... it's perfect for when you have too much data to fit onto a single CD, but too little to justify sticking it onto a DVD.

Price was around £80 with VAT from Scan.

 

[nath]

Do these HD-Burn cd's play on any cd player or just the one's capable of reading/writing them?

 

[SoWat]

As far as I know they'll only play on HD-Burn compatible devices. I tried them on my CDR drive and they weren't recognised. They were recognised on my Laptop's DVD/CDR drive though.

Not a big problem for me as they contain data that is only for the system it came off.

I believe that only decent quality CDRs will pass the pre-burn test also.

edit: ZDNet had this to say about it.

 

[Yaka]

hmmm latest firmware from pioneer has fixed alot of things for me. no more cd-r coasters and ritek go4 dvd-rs burn @ 8x.

 

[smurkin]

As for burners I have this on (back) order

MSI DR8-A 8x DVD±R/±RW (Black) - Retail (CD-009-MS)

£99 inc

It was supposed to be in stock - I've been waiting 2 weeks for it....dont get me started

Well, I got the above...seems to be a good burner...came with Nero...last night I burned quake 1, 2 & 3 @ 4x (including all my mods) onto a single disk...and the quake3.exe even works loading from the DVD....marvelous I tried some movies...and haven't had a coaster yet...& they work in my living room player too *chuffed* weird thing is...it seems to run from a generic windows driver ?!? works fine tho