Affordable Dual Layer Media?

[Sulaco]

Will dual layer discs ever be affordable? Or will they become some specialty thing that stays overpriced? I am wondering if the demand will be great enough for us to see prices come down significantly over time. At ten dollars each, I am still waiting to buy any in quantity.

[chunkT]

Sure when demand goes up and more places ramp up production prices will fall I can remember paying 4-6 bucks for dvd-r when they first came out.

[Cholerabob]

Lol i remeber selling them at 29.99$ when they first came out. Now DL media can be found at around 8-10$ a piece.

[Senior]

5 pack ritek dual layer DVD+R at $29 after mail-in rebate. That's $6 each. Still too expensive.

[lordsmurf]

I wouldn't mind $5 a pop if they actually worked. The problem is +DL is not that great.

[tekkieman]

I wouldn't mind $5 a pop if they actually worked. The problem is +DL is not that great.

ls - I know typical conversational norms rival that of Baldrick, but as your opinion carries a fair amount of weight here, would you care to elaborate on that statement? As someone who plans on some DL experiments, even a $5/ea, I would rather avoid any known pitfalls if possible.

[Capmaster]

The price will go down when they start making them in larger quantities. That won't happen until they improve the quality and increase the demand. They won't improve until they think they're going to sell enough to recoup the engineering costs. They won't sell enough to do that until the demand goes up. The demand won't go up until they improve the quality........

[RottenFoxBreath]

it seems to be the quality of burn,compatibility of playback,and price and quality of media,all being in the mediocre at best category.
as a DL burner myself,i have little to no problems at all,simply using dvddecrypter,iso read,iso write,and playback on my players seems fine,layer changes in the same place,etc.
but i did have plenty problems using nero6 for my first few trys,shit attempts to say the least-1 of my players,an LG wouldnt even spit the disc out,and had to be disassembled to retrieve said disc to throw in the bin.

[Adder_78]

I wouldn't mind $5 a pop if they actually worked. The problem is +DL is not that great.

Same here. Even Verbatim DL's have problems.

[SLICK RICK]

The price will go down when they start making them in larger quantities. That won't happen until they improve the quality and increase the demand. They won't improve until they think they're going to sell enough to recoup the engineering costs. They won't sell enough to do that until the demand goes up. The demand won't go up until they improve the quality........

Well that is one way of looking at it Cap. :P

[lordsmurf]

I wouldn't mind $5 a pop if they actually worked. The problem is +DL is not that great.

ls - I know typical conversational norms rival that of Baldrick, but as your opinion carries a fair amount of weight here, would you care to elaborate on that statement? As someone who plans on some DL experiments, even a $5/ea, I would rather avoid any known pitfalls if possible.

The discs have disasterous compatibility issues, especially on layer breaks. Software support is beta-quality at best. The disc quality is not ironed out either, very likely to make coasters even on the "best" media available.

It's like owning beta software or test hardware, nowhere near being ready for mass consumer use, but the typical half-assed approach of the always-in-danger RW Alliance (note: danger from being undercut by tried-and-true DVD Forum products) is what causes them to continuously release crap before it's viable. This has been their MO since the beginning. DVD Forum backs itself on making quality products that work and are to-spec. Time is not their #1 factor, but rather the quality of the format. RW Alliance is a bunch of greedy rebel bastards that value dollars over quality. As long as they get paid, they could care less what kind of crap is on the open market. They hide this with deceptive marketing, most notably the PLUS (and "MINUS") naming scheme they have CONTINUOUSLY tried to foist on consumers. "We're plus, we're positive, woo-hoo, look at us, buy me!"

+DL is the latest flop. In time, it'll surely correct itself, just like the single layer media has done, but don't expect that for at least 6 more months (maybe even longer if it 100% mimics the success rate of SL media).

RW Alliance is fighting an uphill battle. Which is fine. I hate monopolies. But at least get your act together on the product. RW Alliance should be the Linux of OS's, the DISH Network of satellite tv, the Saturn of USA cars. Not the Chernobel (sp?) of energy plants.

[tekkieman]

ls - Thanks for the extended explanation. Now, let's see if my translation is correct....

If you're just doing DVD-9 to DVD-9 backups, you could... a) just buy a second copy because it's pretty much guarantied to work for around the same price, or b) use DVD Decrypter, do an ISO read / ISO write, and it might work, or it might not.

If you are creating your own compilations, your conversion process may be fine, your authoring process may be fine, your burn may be successful (or not), and it may or may not play in your standalone. You may not have done anything wrong, it could just be your hardware, your software, or your media, and there's not a damn thing you can do about it. If however, you're doing it at $5.00 a pop instead of $8-10 a pop, consider yourself lucky.

Does that pretty much sum it up?

[lordsmurf]

Your authoring also requires a precise layer break, so unless you're using older software that is "pro" in nature, you'll likely have trouble. The easy/new/non-pro (even if it says "pro" in the software title) software with "ADDED" or "UPDATED" DL abilities are not always working correctly.

Last I had seen, Decrypter ISO read/write was not working correctly. I do know that was being addressed.

Make these two additions, and that pretty much sums it up.

[lordsmurf]

Adder_78, nice site, mpegit.net

[fritzi93]

RW Alliance is a bunch of greedy rebel bastards that value dollars over quality. As long as they get paid, they could care less what kind of crap is on the open market. They hide this with deceptive marketing, most notably the PLUS (and "MINUS") naming scheme they have CONTINUOUSLY tried to foist on consumers. "We're plus, we're positive, woo-hoo, look at us, buy me!"

Yeah, conniving fuckers. Clever, though, when they gave their format a name, they successfully RENAMED their competition. One has to wonder if that sort of thing will work in the long run. P.T.Barnum said something about nobody ever going broke by underestimating the public's intelligence.

Me, I'm waiting for the next thing. HD, sounds too blah. Blu-Ray, now that sounds just too cool!

[Edmund Blackadder]

Yeah, conniving fuckers.

Me, I'm waiting for the next thing. HD, sounds too blah. Blu-Ray, now that sounds just too cool!

Well, a lot of you guys hate "+" camp with passion, but really love the upcoming Blu-Ray (and not HD-DVD). That kind of doesn't make much sense, as Blu-Ray is just as much of a bastard as the DVD+R/RW/R DL products. Blu-Ray is not supported by the DVD Forum. So those of you who swear by DVD Forum products should probably stick with HD-DVD support, just to show the consistency of your opinions. Blu-Ray to HD-DVD is essentially what's "+" to "-". And if you don't stick with HD-DVD, then all your talk about loyalty and support of DVD Forum is just a bunch of bullshit.

[fritzi93]

Just a joke. I have no idea yet what will win in the Blu-ray vs. HD stakes. Also tried to make a minor joke about which name appeals more. Bad joke. Oh well.

[-jsl-]

Using good authoring and burning software, good media and a good burner DVD+R DL works just fine. Most complaints seem to come from people that either have not tried it at all (like Lordsmurf judging by his comments) or have used buggy software (like early Nero 6 versions), bad media (Ritek have quality problems) or burners not writing compatible discs (because they don't support bitsetting or are just crap). That some products are bad and don't follow the specifications is not unique for DVD+R DL and you can't blame it on a bad format. I'm sure DVD-R DL will face the same problems when it arrives.

For comments from people that actually have used DL media check for example the media list here and you'll see that most people report success.

Currently MKM (good) and Ritek (not so good) are the only DL media readily available but hopefully Ricoh and Philips/CMC should show up soon too and be of good quality, eventually leading to lower prices. Prodisc and Infomedia also have DL in the works but I don't expect so much from them when it comes to quality.

[Sulaco]

Uh, I don't know what all of the "alliance" and "forum" talk is about, but I have had a 100% success rate with DL media thus far. Granted, I have only done it about ten times, but it worked every single time, and on various players to boot. Maybe I am lucky?

I used the Best Buy special the first time and the rest were the 3 packs from Newegg. I used a Teac drive flashed into a Lite-On SOHW-832S. My Sony and Toshiba players as well as an MSI DVD-ROM drive all played and switched layers flawlessly. The only player I have had issues with was a DVD/VCR combo unit made by Samsung.

I used DVD Decryptor and Any DVD depending on if I went to the HDD first or burned on the fly. I used Nero 6 to actually burn the backups.

Oh well, I guess we will just have to wait and see what happens.

[Skith]

Do not forget about the (recorder's) firmware. Burn quality and support for new media can be added through firmware updates. This is by no means a "smoking gun," but can make a significant difference (for both DL and SL media).

Also, regarding the higher prices of DL Media, demand may not lower prices. The problem lies within the manufacturing process. Yields on DL discs are only somewhere around 50%. (This info from a thread over at http://club.cdfreaks.com.) I do not have the exact link, but a search should turn it up.

***Disclaimer: The above is my understanding based on various discussions and articles which I have read. I have no first hand knowledge or info, and love to be corrected if something I post is wrong.***

[Edmund Blackadder]

Just a joke. I have no idea yet what will win in the Blu-ray vs. HD stakes. Also tried to make a minor joke about which name appeals more. Bad joke. Oh well.

Fritzi93, what I was saying wasn't anything personal about you . It's just that your joke (a good joke) was pretty much reflecting a general drift of opinions coming from certain elite members of this site.

I will not talk about anybody in particular, and it would take far too much time trying to find any particular posts that I've seen, but it seems that whatever they say on one occasion doesn't always glue together with something that they say later on. And when that sort of thing repeats a lot of times, I simply don't trust their opinions anymore. That's about it. So, no matter how respected those certain members are on this site (some of them call themselves Post Whores), I would pretty much take their advice with a big lump of salt . Some of the elite don't even seem to care to [video]help other ordinary members (those people who don't happen to be hanging around in Out Of Topic forum).

So, my point is, if somebody is so patriotic and says that DVD Forum is the only body they trust when it comes to DVD formats, then please don't say that Blu-Ray is better than HD-DVD. HD-DVD is the final and official DVD Forum format. I don't have neither Blu-Ray nor HD-DVD, and won't be buying them in the near future. Perhaps Blu-Ray is better than HD-DVD, but then again perhaps "+" is also better than "-" .

P.S.: I use both "+" and "-" formats and happy with both when they work properly. And it just happened that DVD+RW Alliance was the first to bring recordable DVD9 to the market. Finally, with proper media/hardware/sotware combination, DVD+R DL actually works remarkably well and has great compatibility with most devices.

P.P.S.: Verbatim DL media so far is the most reliable. I still cannot make some of my DVD players to read Ritek DL's second layer without hiccups . I actually have this weird feeling that CMC, when they come out with their DL media, will actually be pretty good. I don't trust Prodisc though, because I have been burning CD-R's since 1998 and still have a lot of CD's from that era up until now and Prodiscs were the only ones that silently become unreadable over time. They burned perfect and look great cosmetically, but give them a couple of years and about 50% of them will be dead (especially towards the outer edge). I know that DVD's are different from CD's, but I wouldn't trust a company again, using whose products I've lost too much data and music in the past. Not even Princo's did that to me. I still have CMC CD-R's recorded back in 1999 and as long as you don't scratch their overly-delicate top, they still work perfect and give great scans. When there's problem developing at the cosmetic/visible level, it's easy to spot it and make a backup (older CMC's). But with Prodiscs, there was no warning whatsoever, so that's bad. So, I think CMC has a good potential of making some decent DL DVD's. In my past experience with Ritek and CMC CD's and DVD's, if they burn and verify well, they will last for a very long time. So far Ritek DVD+D DL doesn't burn well, so let's see what CMC comes up with

[chunkT]

I have done about 10 of the Ridata DL medias for 5 for 35 bucks and all of them play and work excellent.. dunno what to say..

[Edmund Blackadder]

I have done about 10 of the Ridata DL medias for 5 for 35 bucks and all of them play and work excellent.. dunno what to say..

Yes, Ritek D01 DL DVD's indeed work very well on some players while not so well on others, and that's only an issue for the second layer. First layer (the semi-transparent one) works well on any player. For example here's my list of what plays and what stutters:

Pioneer DV-535 - second layer stutters
Pioneer DV-533 - plays perfect
Toshiba D-R1 - plays perfect
Sampo DVE-631CF - second layer sometimes plays, sometimes stutters
Sony DRU-700A/DRU710A - plays perfect
Sony DRX-500ULX - plays perfect
LiteON XJ-HD166S - second layer stutters

I tried burning Ritek D01 on both DRU-700A and DRU-710A with different firmwares, including the LiteON firmwares and also patched firmwares, all with the same result. It looks like the reflectivity of the second layer on Riteks is not very good yet, and that's why some players have major issues with it.

On the other hand, all of the above equipment has absolutely no problems reading Verbatim MKM DL DVD's. Unless it was a bad burn, of course .

[chunkT]

Ok good to know.

[jtommyj]

I have burned about 8 of the Ritek Dl discs and all 8 play fine and don't stutter on any of my 3 set-top players. A Philips 711, A Toshiba 3950, and a little Desay (bought at Radio Shack the other day for PAL to NTSV discs).

The ONLY method i have used is direct iso read to write with DVD-Decrypter.


Tom

[tommyoz]

Wherever there is a discussion on DL media you'll find Edmund to

I have some riteks in my bank but have not tried them yet. I have had success with the Verbatims. Even still, I am not doing much DL recording due to some of the reasons that lordsmurf mentioned. I think it will be a while (just like anything) before they straighten everything out. They may play fine now but who knows.

[sammie]

I went through a price drop analysis a while back. It appears that DL is following the same price curve that pretty much any new format has followed. That is it's price is dropping by about half every 10 months or so. It is also going through the same compatability and QC problems that new media have always gone through. EXCEPT, and I believe statements from the manufacturers seem to back me up, that there is a significant issue with getting the disks made right. They are still getting a large number of coasters at the factory, and that might slow up the price fall even more.

The biggest question in my mind is will DLs become the "Normal" disk before Blu or HD hit the consumer market? With "Pro-sumer" units hitting the market already, it seems to me that DL technology only has about an 18 (12?) month jump on Blu or HD. The only reason I'm not writing off DL altogether is that it SHOULD be compatible with the existing hardware base. If they get the bugs out, something like 80% of the set top boxes will probably end up compatible. Plus, unless you buy a "-" burner in the next 8 months, your next DVD burner will probably be DL whether you want it to be or not.

Figuring that Blu/HD disks will start in that $30 plus range, that means about 2 years before anyone will seriously consider them beyond the early adopters. Will DL hit that magic under $2 a pop range to become the "standard" before then? The simple math says yes. But the real question is will the QC problems delay it enough that most folks say screw it I'll wait for Blu/HD? Six to eight month delays in dropping below the $2 level will do it. My bet is that DL does better than 2.88 M floppies (too many DL set top boxes already and essentialy 100% of commercial stuff is DL), but never becomes the main "standard" backup media before it's replaced.

My take is right now that even if DL disks were $2 and there were no burning or compatibility issues, I'd still only use DL about 20 - 30% of the time. I wouldn't see that ratio changing until SL and DL became almost equivalent in price, and I don't mean per Gig, but say both in the the under $1 price range. I'm not sure that will ever happen, unless manufacturers simply stop making SL media at some point.

[lordsmurf]

But with the massive amount of burners out there, many of them years old, don't expect SL to disappear anytime soon. VHS tapes are still everywhere, and that's not been the major recording format for a couple of years now. And I doubt blank tapes are even going anywhere anytime soon.

[sammie]

But with the massive amount of burners out there, many of them years old, don't expect SL to disappear anytime soon. VHS tapes are still everywhere, and that's not been the major recording format for a couple of years now. And I doubt blank tapes are even going anywhere anytime soon.

Exactly Lord S. For Singles to go away, DL media would have to be compatible with say..............95% of the SL burners out there. Plus, the cost per disk single vs. double for manufactuers would have to no longer offset the overhead in maintaining both manufacturing setups. Both of these would have to happen, and I'm not sure about the chances of either one happening, especially anytime soon.

Plus let's not forget where we are these days. Putting aside DiVX, cheap super high capacity hard disks and convergent media center PCs (will back up DVDs become altogether moot?). we now have DVD Shrink, DVD ReBuilder and DVD FAB (among a zillion other programs) These 3 now make re-authoring, re-encoding and splitting of DVD-9s all but idiot proof. Be honest, how many DVDs have you backed up lately that haven't fit comfortably into one of these 3 options? I can think of maybe 2 or 3 and that's a real reach! I think the only thing keeping DL from being a curious footnote is the POTENTIAL compatibility with the huge, huge, huge already installed hardware and software (commercial DVDs) base. IMHO, if they don't get essentially ALL the kinks worked out and the price down to under $2 in the next 18 months or so, it will always be a bit of a stepchild. Most of us will do some, just because the burners will have the capability...........but the >50% of backups will probably go straight from SL to Blu/HD.

[lordsmurf]

I pretty much detest the "backup" crowd altogether. I consider them a blight on the video hobby, especially the nerds that brag about their Netflix/BB activities. I can see valid reasons for backup technology, and I've used it myself quite a few times (in the early years, it was not easy!). It's nice to have backup ability, but there almost needs to be an IQ test or training video to watch before people are allowed to buy a burner. I even more despise the "download" crowd and P2P users. These people have no shame and are generally happy with (and even defend!) low quality video.

For many of us, the beauty of DL will be expanded content ability. Either to bump bitrate/resolutions, or to simply take advantage of current methods and have more space per media. And these are going to be the people that buy into the formats. We don't care if discs are $10 each (at first!), but they have to work reliably, and right now, they don't.

Having the price down to appease some sort of "backup value" is ridiculous. Those people don't matter at all, as they really don't make up the bulk of media customers. At least not for the first couple of years. Media has to lower itself to cheapskate level to appease these people, and even then, I see them complaining about 25-cent media. Losers.