TTH02 TDK DVD-Rs at Compusa--BEWARE!!!

[terryj]

Took advantage of Compusa's Memorial Day sale,
bought two 50pk TDK DVD-Rs for $12.99 each.

Should have relaized at that price=too good to be true.

Media Code comes up as TTH02, and into second spindle now.
First Spindle, medium errors produced on 11 out 50(!),
second spindle 10 discs in, 4 gave medium errors.

BUYER BEWARE!

Going back to my TDK's from Supermediastore.com.
Higher priced ($20 for 50), but coaster ratio less than
5 per 50pk. CompUSA should be shot for selling such
crap!

[budz]

Which is why I stopped using TDK DVD media a long time ago.

[CaptainVideo]

That's odd, I bought the same ones and mine has a media code of TDK, not TTH. Have had error free burns on at least a dozen that I've used so far.

[Bjs]

Tdk now outsource's for supply ... nothing but crap now .

I use datastream or verbatim's ... atleast verbatim's have never stuffed me about ... but there is alway's a chance when thing's are beyond our control .

The last of the good tdk's have a blue surface ... the gold and silver are s### ... nero report's nothing but error's with them .

After the first 4 of 50 tdk's had error , I didnt bother trying the rest , took it back , told them what was wrong , and they swapped them without further question ... that's BigW here in au ... good people .

[CrayonEater]

I too made the mistake of buying TDKs a few months back at CompUSA. 5 out of 6 coasters. Then I took 'em back and got a refund.

[hech54]

Media Code comes up as TTH02, and into second spindle now.

All of my TDK's have this media code...

Tdk now outsource's for supply ... nothing but crap now . The last of the good tdk's have a blue surface ... the gold and silver are s### ... nero report's nothing but error's with them.

...all of my TDK's...with the above media code are blue topped...never a coaster with my LG 4040B or my 4167B drives. However I am in Europe so you never know...maybe ours are different?...

[Gen-An]

TTH02 is made in Taiwan by CMC and possibly in India by MBIL with TDK's materials and equipment (hence the TDK media code). TDK no longer manufactures optical media; it closed down the Luxembourg plant and I believe the one in Japan is now dedicated to Blu Ray/HD DVD

[CaptainVideo]

Here is what Nero CD-DVD Speed says:

Nero CD-DVD Speed: Disc Info
Raw Data
Physical Format Information (00h)
0000 - A1 0F 02 00 00 03 00 00 00 26 05 3F 00 00 00 00 - .........&.?....
0010 - 00 00 07 54 44 4B 00 00 00 00 00 30 30 33 00 38 - ...TDK.....003.8
0020 - 23 54 37 12 02 4A 73 02 9C 6E 15 15 0B 0B 08 08 - #T7..Js..n......
0030 - 01 19 1B 0C 0C 0C 0D 01 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 - ................

I bought two 50 packs. No errors yet.

[Gen-An]

CaptainVideo, are those Made in India?

[zoobie]

You get what you pay for
My time's too valuable to goof around wasting it

[Prot]

I bought TDK back when they were MIJ. Since then I have stopped. Only MIT I will buy is Verbatim. Otherwise, only MIJ media.

[hech54]

We must have the last of the good ones here in Germany then. They were good discs but I'm definately not "brand loyal" to TDK in the least....these were just a quick alternative for non-essential backups.

[lordsmurf]

TDK is good media. Usually the drive is the problem, especially with new 16x TDK media.

TDK media codes include TDK, TTG and TTH.

TDK has a similar production arrangement to what Mitsubishi uses.

These are legit TDK discs.

[budz]

TDK is good media. Usually the drive is the problem, especially with new 16x TDK media.

The drive isn't the problem, it's the TDK media itself. My friends and I stopped using TDK media when the dvds would not playback correctly or playback at all. The drives used were (4)PIONEER 107D, numerous BENQ 1620's, 1640's, PLEXTOR 708A & LITEON 811. There is nothing wrong with those drives because when using VERBATIM, TAIYO YUDEN & RICOH the dvds burned fine and they played back okay. So don't say it's the drive that is the problem. As I stated I stopped using TDK long ago and will never use it unless they decide to outsource to a better manufacturer like to TAIYO YUDEN. And we all know that will never happen!

[lordsmurf]

It's still the drive. The other media just cooperated better with the "unknown code" whereas TDK is not. This is more complicated that I have time to explain. Just understand it's the drive in this case. Update the firmware.

Verbatim and TY media is better than TDK. But TDK is not bad. Real Ricoh is close, but all the Ritek-made Ricoh is crap, so their overall quality is under TDK.

[NiteLite]

BUYER BEWARE!

Going back to my TDK's from Supermediastore.com.
Higher priced ($20 for 50), but coaster ratio less than
5 per 50pk. CompUSA should be shot for selling such
crap!

So you pay $40. per 100 TDK with 10% coasters.
I get MIJ Taiyo Yuden from Rima for $32.00 per 100 and zero% coasters.

[lordsmurf]

With TY DVD-R, I still get about 5% coaster rate, it gets horrible on my BTC burner (50% or more). Only on TY DVD+R do I get that 99% level of burning.

No disc is 100% perfect, although some do come quite close. If you get 0% coasters, consider yourself lucky (really are no bad burns) or stupid (they exist, but you've not found them).

And $20 per 50 discs, for good media, is not bad at all. That's less than 50 cents per disc, dirt cheap.

[CaptainVideo]

CaptainVideo, are those Made in India?

Um, no Taiwan according to the packaging.

[Gen-An]

Hmm, I didn't know CMC was making DVD+Rs with TDK media codes.

[lenti_75]

Hmm, I didn't know CMC was making DVD+Rs with TDK media codes.

CMC makes a lot of junk media for a lot of brands....

[terryj]

Smurfy,
I agree with Budz.
You know me, and you know I'm the "unofficial" TDK
tester around these parts ( STDVDMF for me).
The fact is, more Taiwan made TDKS are showing up,
and the quality is going downhill in most cases.

As I've reported, Taiwanese made TDKs sold by Supermediastore
(1-16x, brown packaging, grey top) are good, as are the 1-16x
TDKs ( Video style top, blue packaging) sold by Target,
and others, are good solid media, with less than 5% coasters,
comparable to Taiyo Uden or TY- made Sonys.

But these that CompUSA (in my area) are carrying, are badder than bad.
If I hadn't pressed on through the spindle, I would have
taken them back. For the cost per disc ( $13 a 50pk=0.26¢ a disc)
I chalk it up to lesson learned, and lesson passed on to others
so they don't make my mistake. Since you can't see the media
code on the outside of the packaging ( GOD, I wish you could!
)
better to report the goods to those who need to know.
Same packaging as CUSA's is used BTW on the ones
from Supermediastore,
but SMS' TDKs are TTG02's, not TTH02's. I'm burning off of
a 50 pk of them right now, 4 in, no coasters thus far.

Just my nickel for what its worth.

[Gen-An]

TTG02 is 8x, not 16x.

[ROBERT BLACK]

As I've reported, Taiwanese made TDKs sold by Supermediastore
(1-16x, brown packaging, grey top) are good, are good solid media, with less than 5% coasters,comparable to Taiyo Uden or TY- made Sonys.

I agree. I've used two Taiwanese brown packaged 25pc spindles, NO coasters at all. Just clean burns. These CMC produced spindles must be new.

[oldandinthe way]

BUDZ seems to have listed the drives that show the largest number of media problems on the Videohelp media lists.

Blame the drive or blame the media - its a fact that these drives do not like many brands including CMC, Ritek, princo and whatever.

It appears that LG, Samsung and some other drives are less picky.

Whose fault - a loose specification for DVDs.

Avoid those disks that don't work in your drive, and use those that do. And if a manufacturer changes suppliers or process start over.

[budz]

BUDZ seems to have listed the drives that show the largest number of media problems on the Videohelp media lists.

Blame the drive or blame the media - its a fact that these drives do not like many brands including CMC, Ritek, princo and whatever.

It appears that LG, Samsung and some other drives are less picky.

Whose fault - a loose specification for DVDs.

Avoid those disks that don't work in your drive, and use those that do. And if a manufacturer changes suppliers or process start over.

My opinion is based on my experience with TDK media. It has nothing to do with looking at the media section to see what media works and doesn't. I should have said in my first response to this post that my friends & I used to use TDK DVD MEDIA with the drives that I mentioned. We had no problems with them at the time which was last year. But then suddenly the burns became unreadable only to find out that TDK changed manufacturers that is when the quality of their dvd media went crappy. It's not about the drives that caused those crappy burns. If TDK had good quality dvd media like they had in the past then I would still be buying them. Remember that write strategies are different for every dvd burner. I'm not the only one who thinks TDK DVD media is crap. I've seen at Costco and Compusa all the returned spindles of TDK DVD MEDIA. Obviously the media sucks! Just my 2 big freaking cents!!!

[laspis59]

With TY DVD-R, I still get about 5% coaster rate, it gets horrible on my BTC burner (50% or more). Only on TY DVD+R do I get that 99% level of burning.

DVD+R although you say is not as compatible as DVD-R ALWAYS give better quality results with all the burners I have owned.

Most of the DVD-R's I've bought including TY and Verbatim suck when quality scans are performed.

I say stick with DVD+R,changing the booktype to DVD-ROM if they work on your own/friends/families players.

Just my 2 pence.

[NiteLite]

With TY DVD-R, I still get about 5% coaster rate, it gets horrible on my BTC burner (50% or more). Only on TY DVD+R do I get that 99% level of burning.
No disc is 100% perfect, although some do come quite close. If you get 0% coasters, consider yourself lucky (really are no bad burns) or stupid (they exist, but you've not found them).
And $20 per 50 discs, for good media, is not bad at all. That's less than 50 cents per disc, dirt cheap.

I do consider luck a factor. Also media choice, place of purchase, good choices in writers, several factors.
I have scanned a lot but prefer the quality of viewing on screen. With a few hundred TY burns 4X and 8x written at their rated speed I can say I have never had a failed burn with TY from Rima. I have only used Plextor 708A, 716A, and Benq 1640.
I'll accept luck. No problem.
However, your statement "they exist, but you've not found them" would not imply "stupid." The correct term would be "ignorant. That describes the ability to find them but haven't. Stupid implies the lack of ability even with the knowledge to find them.
Your statement that +R is better than -R in all cases is not even worth consideration at this point in the game.
$20 for good media may not be bad at all. IMO $32. per 100 for "excellent" media is even better.
I have some old TDK Certified Plus CD-R that are excellent media. The newer TDK-MIT is crap comparably. I even owned a TDK CD-R writer awhile back that was very good at what it did.
My post was not a dig on TDK but more of a "why?' Why as in why accept 5% to 50% coasters at all. Change media or writer. Simple.

Stupid? Come on LS. No reason to go for a cheap shot.
Regards,
NL

[xxiangg]

Why should I conclude that a driver is bad just because
it does not work well with TDK? I have a LiteOn812 and
a Plextor 712 writers. Both of them do not like -R TDK.
Since they like Verbatim and TY, I buy Verbatim and TY.
The combination of the media and the writers work very
well. I never thought that I should buy a driver instead.

[lordsmurf]

No cheap shot NiteLite, I figured your case was luck. The stupid comment was for anybody else that may be casually reading and thinking to themselves "all of my burns are perfect 100%".

I see people are selectively reading and skimming again.

I said YUDEN-coded DVD+R are better than TY-coded DVD-R. I said nothing about DVD-R vs DVD+R and which is more or less compatible or anything else. It was a statement about the burn quality of TY's two type of media, nothing more, nothing less.

TDK media has been made in Taiwan since 2003. TDK is not made anywhere else, they don't have plants anywhere. CMC has their contract, I'm not aware of anybody else in the world making TDK media, though not sure of European manufacturers that may provide local to Europe.

I've heard of and personally experienced lower quality TDK media from Circuit City, but only Circuit City. Why? There is not much to go on here, unsure why it happens. Most people guess with some silly reason, I refuse to guess. Some factor is at play, or it's simply bad luck.

[Gen-An]

Lordsmurf, it appears that MBIL is making TDK media as well (I've seen lots of spindles of TDK 16x media with the Made in India label on them at Fry's). TDK did actually make TTH02 in Japan for a while but obviously no one in the Western Hemisphere ever saw any of those.