Sony DVD-RW issue

[dvdguy24]

Hi,

for about two years I was using Imation DVD-RW's and they worked GREAT - but of course, they both gave out on me - which is understandable after two years. So, I couldn't find these at any of the stores in my area so I settled for Sony DVD-RW's - For about 2 months I've been using them - no problem at all....until now. I just made a movie with Pinnacle Studio 8 and burned it to on of my Sony rw's - at the hour and a half mark - it starts to freeze up/however, I can hit the fast forward button and it will skip the "bad" area - so the movie is on there - therefore it's not a Pinnacle issue - I also burned the previously created content to one of my DVD-R's that studio 8 made - and it's flawless. I tried to use the RW twice for the same project and TWICE the freezing happens in the same area - so instead of letting Pinnacle erase it - I tried another program which erased it successfuly before my 2nd try.

I have used the Sony DVD-RW for movies that have been longer than an hour and a half before - and have had no problems - and from the looks of the disc, it's perfectly clean - hardly a mark on it. I have 2 of them - and I would try the other one - however, that one seems to be ruined and I don't know how that happend. If I put it in my DVD drive on the computer, it just constantly spins - it won't stop trying to read it so naturally none of the software that I have on my computer will allow me to erase it because it can't even read it or stop spinning.

So, it looks as though Sony DVD-RW's don't work very well (at least for me)....any suggestions?

From what i've seen, it has nothing to do with my burner or DVD player - it looks like it's a media issue.

[dvdguy24]

Update:

Ok - well, I figured I would make the changes I wanted to - burn the movie to DVD-RW (knowing that the end would be screwed up - due to bad media) and that if everything else looked OK - I would just let Pinnacle burn to my Imation printable DVD-R which are 8X (I let it burn at 1X) (isn't it better to burn at the slowest rate?) Totally ruined it It looked worse than my -RW did! and I thought it would look ok because it burned ok to my memorex -R that I had mentioned in my first post.

The Imations always worked well for me though - I have one movie that I made (same length) and it's fine - of course, I didn't let Pinnacle burn it - it came from an -RW that Pinnacle burned - but this wasn't my first try doing a direct burn to -R either with the printable discs.

What i've done is bought new -RW's from Memorex and hopefully my movie will come out OK on one of them and then i'll copy it onto a printable DVD-R with other software.

This is so frustrating. Would the burn speed have anything to do with my issues? What if I burn a DVD-R at 4x and try to copy it onto another DVD that is 8X? (and at that speed)...does that make a difference?

Sorry for the long messages, but just some suggestions ... ANYTHING would be great - and it looks like there are quite a few experienced people here - I just wish I would stop making coasters .

Thanks!!