Analog capture, 16X disks a waist of money??

[overloaded_ide]

This would be kinda a media post releated to setop recorders only and concerning speeds.

For a settop stand alone recorder doing analog captures directly to disk, I think fast media is a waste of money. Any other opinions? I am still waiting for my SV2000 to arrive, just ordered it.

I will probably be burning all TY 8X printable DVD -R disks in mine maybe, I have 100 pack comming in to use in my PC burners. If I like the settop recorder and use it much, I will probably by GOOD slow media for it to save money, once I run out of slow disks I have now. That is if I find any slow stuff to buy, looks like 8X is about the slowest for decentbrands I like.

I will try the disks I already have here, the older and slower DVD-R I have will be fine if they work in the recorder good.
I have some OLD Princo 1X disks both -R and -RW that I may use up up also if they work. These are from about 3-4 years ago, about the time I joined the forum and disks were expensive even for cheap stuff. I think these were around $1 each back then.
Princos have a bad rap, all I can say is I recently played some of those old disks and they are still working for me. And the old Toshiba drive burned them well for me also, rarely a coaster. Maybe the older ones were better than the newer ones? I have a small stack still.

And Still have some GOOD Ritek printable DVD-R that never made a coaster yet for me, I think G02 from a couple years ago.
I will probably use all this older slower media up if it works in the SV2000 since I will only be capturing VHS anyway.

This is what happens when you go for lower pricing in higher volume, always got disks left over when you move up to the next level
Of course I was doing allot more stuff back then but kinda got out of it for awhile, now getting back in a bit.

Now about the X speeds. How can we relate the X speed of a VHS copy? 1/2X perhaps in SP mode? Also the same with TV capture 1/2X??
What I mean is although 4X or 16X SOUNDS good, it is only usable when burning data stored on a drive or another disk really (video is still data). In order to burn fast, data has to travel fast!
Analog capture is not fast, and if trying to extend the time with like SLP or LP type modes it gets even slower. The disk only holds 4.7gigs of data regaurdless, and I think that's about 1 hour at 1X to burn. I do not plan to burn much "if any" daul layer disks so I am not counting those here.

So if I am captureing from VHS or even TV etc.., directly to the DVD-R through a recorder it will still take 2 hours to play the tape and record a 2hr movie, so I think that is 1/2X

So for people who have a settop recorder with a hard drive in it, or people with a recorder that has a USB or Firewire connection for the PC, they can burn disks faster than you can durring a capture to disk, so for them fast disks may make sense at times.
Good quality cheap disks like 2X or above I THINK is all that would be needed otherwise. Like for me to play a VHS tape and capture to DVD-R the disk can not record any faster than the tape plays anyway so a 2hr movie is burned to disk no faster than 1/2X speed. Maybe a buffer fills then dumps for shorter burts of faster burning in some or maybe not, but over all time is still gonna be a 1/2X burn to capture a 2hr analog source to disk.

If I am wrong about that I'd like to know, and also why it might be wrong, I think it's correct!
So the best slow speed disk you can get for the least amount of money is the best value for analog captures as I see it.

I just ordered 8X TY hub printable 100 pack for $32, same disks in 16X were $38. Thes are mostly for my PC burners and I'll use some on the settop when I get it. But as I see it 4X should be faster than I would ever need if I can find them, or even old 2X.

For stuff like the princo's, are they better if burned at lower speeds than rated? If so, then a 8X may do well in a settop perhaps.

[Frobozz]

The media's rated speed is irrelevant when you are recording in real time directly to disc. So you're theory is correct that speed doesn't matter with standalone recorders that lack a hard drive.

The recording bit rate that allows you to fit more video on a disc does affect picture quality the lower it goes. But it can remain very good up to about 3 hours per disc. I suggest doing a test using the same source video. Record a segment at each of the available recording rates. Play them back to see which ones you prefer for discs you want to keep.

Remember that you can use rewritable media for videos you want to keep a short while or you want to transfer to your PC.

[oldandinthe way]

Remember that in most DVD recorders, you are still dependant on the drive having an appropriate write strategy for the media used.

A modern DVD-recorder may or may not contain write strategies for an ancient blank disk. If it doesn't, your success will depend on whether the default write strategy is good enough.

Many recorder manufacturers provide a list of supported media, anything else may or may not work.