Sony DRU-500A, which format should I burn?

[morac]

All things being equal (including price) and assuming that my DVD player can read both DVD+R(W) and -R(W) discs. Does it make a difference what format I burn to?

[Zakna]

Not in the slightest. Just burn what's cheapest and works with all your equipment. That's the beauty of a dual-format drive.

[Greg12]

DVD+RW is faster than -RW, but -R is more compatible than +R

[riekl]

DVD+RW is faster than -RW, but -R is more compatible than +R

Says who ? Every study I have seen says the exact opposite. DVD +R writes a DVD flag to the disc that DVD-R does not making it more compatable.

[SingSing]

Says people just bought this drive.
There are many post on this drive that the DVD+R won't
play in their DVD players. Most of them finally switch to DVD-R disc.

[bac]

DVD+RW is faster than -RW, but -R is more compatible than +R

Says who ? Every study I have seen says the exact opposite. DVD +R writes a DVD flag to the disc that DVD-R does not making it more compatable.

+R/+RW write a flag to the disk, marking the disk as a dvd+r/rw instead of dvd-rom.
This makes the disk *less* compatible by drives expecting the label to be normal:

http://www.dvdplusrw.org/resources/compatibility_issues.html

Quote: "Some DVD players fail to read a DVD+R or DVD+RW disc when the "compatibility bits" at the lead-in section of a disc do not contain the value for DVD-ROM. "

This compatibility bit setting can be controlled for older burners, but there is no published
way to modify this setting for current burners such as the sony dru500.

[tonyp12]

Intellikey Labs reported that DVD+R is 90% compatible.

It reported that DVD-R is only 77%



http://www.met.com.tw/eng/news/news.htm

[bac]

Intellikey Labs reported that DVD+R is 90% compatible.

It reported that DVD-R is only 77%



http://www.met.com.tw/eng/news/news.htm

That press release shows conflicting results and is devoid of technical detail.
Seems likely that intellikey was testing phsical compatibility and did not test
the logical compatibility problem posed by the compatibility bitsetting.
Clearly the compatability bitsetting poses a compatibility problem, and is not backwards
compatible with dvd-rom. The fact that this problem exists shows a lack of understanding
of backwards compatibility on the part of dvd burner vendors.

[bac]

Furthermore:

"Then we have logical format compatibility issue(s). The very ground for all the controversy around DVD+RW, rather around DVD+RW media not being playable in a whole range of players. DVD+RW Alliance was keen to blame on DVD-ROM vendors, even claiming that they deliberately block playback. But the fact is that format specifications don't explicitely say that unrecognized format [designated by "Book Type" field in "Control Data Zone" of the lead-in] should be treated as DVD-ROM and [in my opinion] it was rather naive of them to claim and expect that the media will be playable in "virtually all players." This deficiency was recognized by practically all DVD+RW vendors [apparently all except Sony] and a secret vendor-specific command manipulating this "Book Type" field was implemented."

http://fy.chalmers.se/~appro/linux/DVD+RW/

[Kennyshin]

There are 2.4x DVD+RW media available easily. For write-once media, DVD-R 1x is the cheapest solution. Most people buy DVD-R because they are very cheap, not because they are more compatible than DVD+R. If your own players and drives can read both DVD+R and DVD-R, good for you. If your own players and drives can read DVD-R, but not DVD+R, you can either buy only DVD-R or replace your existing players and drives that can read both DVD-R and DVD+R. If your own players and drives can read DVD+R, but not DVD-R, you can either buy only DVD+R or replace your existing players and drives that can read both DVD-R and DVD+R.

[bac]

Yes, the manufacturers would appreciate it if you bought new equipment to work around
the incompatibility problems that they needlessly introduced.
I cannot read DVD+RW media on my laptop dvd drive and it is only 1 year old. IBM
reports that the newer model of dvd drive (with cd+rw burn support) has the same
limitation.

If only sony supported the "book type" manipulation commands, one could probably
work around this compatibility problem without buying any new equipment.
In the mean time, it is misleading for sony and others to market dvd+r/rw as if it
does not have such compatibility issues.

[jeepers94]

PC Magazines article about the two formats compatibility told how Intellikey did the tests for Pioneer.Later they did the tests again for their own use.Pioneers results were ,of course,in favor of -format.But even these findings were almost dead even.As stated above,RW was greatly in the + formats favor.I have a Pioneer DV444 player,and I can tell you the + media works better in my deck! I have had very few discs that do not work as they should!

[bac]

I wonder if intellikey tested with any recent panasonic laptop drives.
It is easy to lie with statistics. For their dvd-r tests, they could have used old players
that cannot read dvd-r, in order to make the dvd-r results look worse.

Basically I am arguing with technical facts and details, and you guys are responding with
information from marketing press releases, and anecdotal evidence.

[bac]

You guys like statistics? Look at:
http://www.dvdplusrw.org/resources/compatibilitylist_dvdrom.html

The # of drives in that list of 211 that work without the compatibility
bitsetting is 127. That's a 40% failure rate.
And this comes from a web page that is trying to evangelize dvd+r/rw.

[tonyp12]

That's a 40% failure rate.
.

I look at that page and see a high rate for DVD+R

When comparing - and +, mostly only interested in R and not RW.

Do you have any prof that DVD-RW have a higer rate of readablity?

[bac]

That's a 40% failure rate.
.

I look at that page and see a high rate for DVD+R

When comparing - and +, mostly only interested in R and not RW.

Do you have any prof that DVD-RW have a higer rate of readablity?

It's not clear what compatibility mode setting is being used for the DVD+R tests in
that table. I should think the setting would apply to both.

I'm actually interested in RW compatability not R. DVD-R works fine for me when I don't
need RW.

No, I don't have DVD-RW specific info, as +RW is more interesting in the RW case.

[morac]

Well so far I've only burned DVD+RW discs and they are read fine by my 3+ year old DVD-Rom drive.

I have a PS2 (version 5) which I used to play DVDs, but from I've read it doesn't reliably support any burnable DVD format.

[onyx666]

.I have a Pioneer DV444 player,and I can tell you the + media works better in my deck! I have had very few discs that do not work as they should!

Jeepers i also have a DV444 player, do you mean the DVD+r Plays better then DVD-R ? because i just ordered a pioneer A05. Maybe i better cancel it then and buy the sony ? (i never use DVD rw)

[JasonK]

Take everything you read here and in those tests with a grain of salt. Tests that say a media is compatible simply because it can be formatted or seen doesn't mean jack. Check out the templates in the other threads to see influencing factors.

[Jester700]

I don't think ANY tests have been conclusive. They've all been limited, either in the sheer # of DVD players tested, the scope of the testing, etc.

Other than the fact that write-once is better either way, I mean.

IMO, check the results of the players YOU will play on - yours, maybe your friends', girlfriend's, parents', etc. Choose based on that.

Of course, the Sony really doesn't make you choose. An several more are coming out soon that are the same way.

[bac]

Good to see that we agree about the value of the tests.
Yes, since none of the media is totally compatible, one has to hunt for the media type
that works best with one's own equipment.

I asked Panasonic about the DVD+R/RW compatability problem with the sr-8175 drive,
basically begging them for a firmware fix. Here is the response I got back:

"We is the member of the DVD forum. We do not support the Disc outside the forum."

Sounds like they intentionally fail to interoperate with dvd+r/rw. Thanks panasonic!

[ItsMe]

Zdnet in Belgium have done a small test here are the results:

DVD+R: 93 procent
DVD-R: 75 procent
DVD+RW: 64 procent
DVD-RW: 61 procent

Table here:

http://www.zdnet.be/images/nw0211/testdvd-recordables.jpg

What I'm trying to say is, unless somebody tests all the players out there with all the different media that is available, then we will never really know which is the most compatible.

All DVD players should support at least DVD-R and DVD+R, if a player doesn't then its a crap player.