What's good these days.

[astrocity20]

It's been a while since I've bought DVD-Rs. So what's good these days. As far as I've heard some Verbatims are TYs... but how would you tell? The last thing I bought were 2 25 packs of Maxells, Made in Japan that ended up being some sort of Riteks. But I've heard the G05s suck.

Anyhow I'm looking for something decent in 4x dvdrs. Preferably something I can just get locally like TY Verbatims But what should I be looking for out in the world or online?

[Gen-An]

It's going to be hard to find 4x media period, good or not. Most of the manufacturers have long since discontinued it; in fact they're discontinuing 8x media and shifting all of their lines over to 16x. You didn't mention what country you are in so it's hard to recommend any places to shop.

[Bodysurf]

It's been a while since I've bought DVD-Rs. So what's good these days. As far as I've heard some Verbatims are TYs... but how would you tell? The last thing I bought were 2 25 packs of Maxells, Made in Japan that ended up being some sort of Riteks. But I've heard the G05s suck.

Anyhow I'm looking for something decent in 4x dvdrs. Preferably something I can just get locally like TY Verbatims But what should I be looking for out in the world or online?

<http://www.NoMoreCoasters.COM>.

[astrocity20]

oh, I'm in the US.

I've been to "nomorecoasters" but I didn't know if it was up to date or not. Seems like by them I should stick to Maxells. I'm afraid of getting a G05, I've heard that they burn fine then after a few weeks people will get no read errors and basically they mess up. So I'm looking towards the Verbatims since I've heard some are TYs, but was wondering if there was anyway of identifying them as such.

What store-bought kind have you guys had good burns with? I've personally never seen "Ridatas" "Prodisc" etc around on shelves. Only stuff like "Sony", "Verbatim" "TDK" etc.

[lordsmurf]

Sony DVD+R (made in Japan) = YUDEN media
Sony DVD+R (made in Taiwan) = SONY media
Sony DVD-R (made in Japan) = TY or SONY media
Fuji DVD+R (made in Japan) = YUDEN media
Fuji DVD-R (made in Japan) = TY media
Verbatim DVD-R (made in Taiwan) = MCC media
Verbatim DVD+R (made in Taiwan) = MCC media
Maxell DVD-R (made in Japan) = MXL media
Maxell DVD+R (made in Japan) = MAXELL media
TDK DVD-R (made in Taiwain) = TDK media

Pick one.
OfficeMax has MCC Verbatim on sale, Best Buy has Fuji on sale. Best Buy, Staples, Office Depot, Walmart, Fry's and OfficeMax are all fine places to pick up some of these discs.


edit: fixed typo

[mikesbytes]

Fuji DVD-R (made in Japan) = YUDEN media
Fuji DVD-R (made in Japan) = TY media

Whats the difference between TY and YUDEN ?

[ROF]

Maxell made in taiwan 8x have been working rather well for me. I bought them on sale and haven't had any problems with them.

[lordsmurf]

TY is DVD-R
YUDEN is DVD+R

Both are Taiyo Yuden codes.

[astrocity20]

I guess I'll try for the Verbatim's, I don't wanna buy a hundred pack of Fuji at $35.00 and not be sure about what I'm getting. Hm, the Verbatims are 16x as well. Hopefully they'll burn just fine at 4x. And since I don't see any Maxells for sale... well then.

Coulda swore the old rule was "Made in Taiwan"= bad though :P

edit: And of course if they end up being shite Smurf, you'll hear from me lol. I miss the days of cdr buying. You could buy damned near anything then.

[Bix]

Verbatim DVD-Rs are made according to Verbatim/MCC's own high quality specifications w/ their own materials, so they're the exception to the rule.

[suppafreak]

I have been using Verbatim DataLife DVD-R for quite sometime. The media is very good. I have never had problem burning it. Just recently I decided to try the TY DVD-R and YUDEN DVD+R. So far no problems either. TY and YUDEN though made in Japan.

Try www.supermediastore.com. They sell authentic TY DVD-Rs and YUDEN DVD+Rs.

[astrocity20]

Verbatim DVD-Rs are made according to Verbatim/MCC's own high quality specifications w/ their own materials, so they're the exception to the rule.

Has this always been the case? Cause I seem to remember some time ago when Verbatim's weren't hailed in this high regard.

[northcat_8]

I burn use the RitekG05 discs, never had any problem with them that wasn't between my desk and my chair.

I buy them from newegg.com

[lordsmurf]

Verbatim DVD-Rs are made according to Verbatim/MCC's own high quality specifications w/ their own materials, so they're the exception to the rule.

Has this always been the case? Cause I seem to remember some time ago when Verbatim's weren't hailed in this high regard.

Several years ago, they outsourced to CMC for about 8 months or so.

[Gen-An]

Verbatim DVD-Rs are made according to Verbatim/MCC's own high quality specifications w/ their own materials, so they're the exception to the rule.

Has this always been the case? Cause I seem to remember some time ago when Verbatim's weren't hailed in this high regard.

Several years ago, they outsourced to CMC for about 8 months or so.

You mean supplying discs with CMC media codes? I remember some of the 2.4x DVD+R media being like that. Fortunately by the 4x days they had cut that almost totally out (I think there were some multicolor 4x +R packages that were Ricoh media).

[lordsmurf]

Yeah, 2x DVD-R were all CMC for many months there

[astrocity20]

Thanks smurf... I got the Verbatims and they were MCC 03RG20. Here's hoping they burn well.

[lemmy999]

Sony DVD+R (made in Japan) = YUDEN media
Sony DVD+R (made in Taiwan) = SONY media
Sony DVD-R (made in Japan) = TY or SONY media
Fuji DVD-R (made in Japan) = YUDEN media
Fuji DVD-R (made in Japan) = TY media
Verbatim DVD-R (made in Taiwan) = MCC media
Verbatim DVD+R (made in Taiwan) = MCC media
Maxell DVD-R (made in Japan) = MXL media
Maxell DVD-R (made in Japan) = MAXELL media
TDK DVD-R (made in Taiwain) = TDK media

Pick one.
OfficeMax has MCC Verbatim on sale, Best Buy has Fuji on sale. Best Buy, Staples, Office Depot, Walmart, Fry's and OfficeMax are all fine places to pick up some of these discs.

I had always bought Fuji DVD+R in the 50 pack at Best Buy because they were the only ones Made in Japan. The 100 pack were made in Taiwan. However, I was in there the other day and all Fuji +R were made in Taiwan. The -R were Japan though. The only +R made in Japan were the Sony, so I am going to grab some of those.

[astrocity20]

Well I've finally had to start in on burning my new Verbatim disks. I've only done two, the first one burnt without problems... the second however has some bad sectors \ I'm really hoping this won't happen often.

edit: btw is there anyway of knowing whether a disk is a coaster before you actually burn it? Any program you can run that'll tell you if the disk has bad sectors etc?

[mikesbytes]

I stopped burning 8x disks @ 8x and now have burnt the last 10 8x disks @ 4x. Not enough to come to a conclusion, but none of those 10 have failed.

[astrocity20]

Well, my burner only goes to 4x max. And I burn disks at 2x so I've one upped you :P

[zoobie]

I read that some newer 16x discs don't take kindly to burning at 4x and you actually have to use higher speeds

[mikesbytes]

Having read about burner / disk / speed for a long time, there seems to be no golden solution. Everyone has had different experiences.

Generally the faster a disk is burned, the hotter it gets. Perhaps burning it too slow will not produce enough heat?

[astrocity20]

Gah, this is not good to hear. Maybe I'll try burning at 4x If not I'm screwed.

[fritzi93]

It might help to know what burner you have. Even better would be for you to fill out your computer details so it's unnecessary to ask.

Anyway, you ask if it's possible to predict whether you'll get a coaster. Not really, but... If you have a BenQ, you can use QScan, which will run a quick test of TE (tracking errors) and FE (focus errors) on a blank disc. Then it will recommend a burning speed. Here's what I see for MCC 03RG20:

16x Not recommended
12x Not recommended
8x Not recommended
4x OK
2.4x OK

I burned one disc at each speed (except 2.4x) on my BenQ 1620 and then ran CDSpeed. Surface scan was okay on all of them. Disc quality ranged from 90 at fastest speed to 96 at 4x speed. Then I tested each to see if they'd play okay on a settop player. They all played okay. Yes, I played them through on successive mornings one week. (I rise at 4 am to have my 2 quarts of coffee and organise my day).

Before someone else says it, not much of a test. But all other things being equal, I'll take the higher quality scan. Crossflashing my burner from generic "G" to "B" firmware, then reflashing to the latest FW improved burn quality by a further 2 points.

Now, it may be that none of this is relevant to your specific situation, but I hope it's given you some feel for what you can do to ensure best results.

You'll have to answer your questions yourself. But more likely than not, burning at 4x won't of itself cause a coaster. Good luck.

[Gen-An]

I read that some newer 16x discs don't take kindly to burning at 4x and you actually have to use higher speeds

I think it has more to do with trying to burn 16x discs in the new 16x burners at such low speeds; I doubt the drive manufacturers optimize the write strategies for the lower speeds on those high speed discs. With burners that are already speed limited though, assuming they have proper firmware support for the 16x discs the burns should be fine.

[INFRATOM]

Fuji printable +R at Best Buy was made in Taiwan but +R 50 packs silver are made in Japan Yuden TO2.

[astrocity20]

thanks Fritzi I'll have to try that program out and see what happens. It might've just been a bum disk who knows. I'll have to wait and see till I burn something else.

edit: :P I just noticed BenQ is a type of drive not a software lol. Oops.

[mikesbytes]

Here's what I see for MCC 03RG20:
16x Not recommended
12x Not recommended
8x Not recommended
4x OK
2.4x OK

What kind of disk is a MCC 03RG20

[gjb]

if you want some dvd-r 4x try the Taiyo Yuden 4x at http://www.shop4tech.com/user.htm. price is $31.00 with free shipping