MXL G03/alternatives

[SilverBlade]

First off, is Maxell producing any more 4X DVD-R media? its hard to find it, and Futureshop hasn't had any 100 spindles in a while

Since the MXL G03's are not doing so well, what media would be as good as the maxell 4X DVD-R's? I have never used Ritek before (dunno where I can find them in winnipeg). I love Maxell as it has worked in everything I threw it in, so I'm looking for the same compatibility rate as the Maxell 4X

[kiki]

Best buy has vakoss disks.
These are prodisk F01.
I have had amazing compatability with these disks
using a nec2500a.
Ritek are available at computer boulevard on
St. james street.
Hope this is of help.

Kiki

[Hawseman]

I feel your pain, SB....

Give the 8X Maxells a shot...try and get the "Made in Japan" ones. I haven't had any problems with them (100+ printables & dark yellow branded). If you really don't want to take the chance, the best alternative (without knowing your burner) is TY. They are arguably the best, and I'd have to agree. I've burned about 100 Fuji 4x TY's in my day....shhhweet!

In another thread, "darkskies" gave this link for 4x TY's....looks like a pretty good deal:

http://www.supermediastore.com/taiyo-yuden-4x-dvd-r-media-silver-matte-spindles.html#buy

Good luck...and keep us posted.

[SilverBlade]

burner is Pioneer A05/105

[Hawseman]

My A06/106 burns Maxell 8x's pretty well (although only at 4x).....They don't burn quite as well as the 4x's (according to Kprobe/CDSpeed), but very acceptable. Truthfully, I haven't burned a whole lot of 8x's on my A06....I still have some 4x's handy for that burner. I burn most 8x's on my two NEC's (2500 & 3500).

I'm not sure what's available in Winnepeg. If you look through the "DVD media" section you may get some hints.

kiki's suggestion of Prodisc should do you well. My Pio loves TY too. Good burners, especially with -R media.

Happy hunting....

[Edmund Blackadder]

If you really don't want to take the chance, the best alternative (without knowing your burner) is TY. They are arguably the best, and I'd have to agree. I've burned about 100 Fuji 4x TY's in my day....shhhweet!

I'd say the best alternative, especially for wide playback compatibility, are MCC Verbatims. Any speed really. They also have the best KProbe scans.

Also, nobody seems to mention the Sony media, like D08, etc.. They are actually very good discs and burn and play just as good as TY's. They even have similar dye appearance. Sony's with Sony ID, either "+" or "-", made in Japan or made in Taiwan are all high quality media. People don't complain about them, but at the same time Sony's are somehow always in the shadow of MXL, TY, MCC, Ritek, Prodisc and many others. I for one would never trust Prodisc again after several of my Prodisc CD's lost their data and music without any warning over the course of a couple of years with proper storage. So I wouldn't trust Prodisc for anything important anymore, be that on CD or DVD. Not even CMC or Princo ever failed me like that.

So give Verbatim (MCC ID) and Sony (Sony ID) a try. Those are good alternatives to Maxell.

[richdvd]

I agree with Ed....MCC discs are excellent.

[lordsmurf]

I've had a spot of bad luck with my most recent MCC 50-count spindle, but all the brown top 8x MXLRG03 are burning perfectly so far.

Go figure.

[Hawseman]

I'll agree, MCC is probably a better general suggestion for media. But with an older Pioneer, I'll stick by my TY/Maxell MIJ suggestion.

I don't have much experience with Prodisc....at one time it was considered pretty good with Pioneer burners, but that was a while back. I'll recind my suggestion in the previous post.

TY has, rarely, had some playback issues in some standalones, but I have yet to see that myself. I have never tried 8x TYG02 -R media in my Pioneer, so I can't comment on how they burn at 4x. I can comment on how TYG01 (4x) burns

@Edmund,

Yes, MCC is great media. Much better QC than Maxell, I might add. I've found a couple Maxell's with fingerprints and smudges right out of the spindle.

Have you burned newer MCC -R (8x or 16x) media on your Pioneer A03? I haven't been too impressed with my A06-FW108 (not hacked) and MCC -R PI error counts. MCC is awesome on my NEC 2500, 3500AG burners & pretty good in my BenQ & Litey (both which are better with +R, booktyping, and do quality scanning). All my drives kick out great scans with my TYG01 media.

Here are some recent scans, all 4.4gb, burned at 4x on my Pioneer A06, fw 108.

MCC02RG20 (8x), scanned with BenQ 1620. Funny thing, I had worse scans after burning, I must not have let it cool down enough. These are definetly playable:


Same disc scanned on Liteon:


BenQ scan with TYG01 media.


Same disc scanned on Liteon:


PIF's look great all around. PI errors with the MCC have me a little bit concerned....a few small scratches "may" push it over the edge. I looks like the firmware is struggling with the MCC write strategy a bit. I don't think we'll see new firmware released for the A05 or A06, Pioneer considers them "discontinued".
With my liteon, PI>200, PIFs>4 starts to give me issues in one of my older players (great "true" testing unit). I'm not sure of the PI/PIF limits with my BenQ. I haven't had enough bad disks lately to make the determination.

NFN-note for noobs: Quality scanning (Kprobe, CDSpeed) is not a final and definite verification for a good burn, it's just a tool. It's a better test of the scanning drive's ability to read your burned media. The only true quality test is playability in your player.

Important final statement: This is my personal experience, your's may, and probably will, differ

[Edmund Blackadder]

Have you burned newer MCC -R (8x or 16x) media on your Pioneer A03? I haven't been too impressed with my A06-FW108 (not hacked) and MCC -R PI error counts.

Hawseman, no I have retired my good old Pioneer A03. It's still sitting inside my computer in a third drive bay, disconnected from IDE, but connected to power. It's there mostly just for looks . But I on occasion check with it if DVD+R or DVD+R DL with DVD-ROM bitsetting are recognized OK (steady light instead of blinking). That is because A03 cannot recognize DVD+R or DVD+R DL without bitsetting to DVD-ROM. Pioneer A03 is a piece of history and I intend to keep it for that. After all it's the very first consumer DVD burner .

My other internal drives are Pioneer A09XL and Sony DRU-700A (Lite-On 832 in reality). Also on top of the computer sits Sony DRX-500ULX, which so far has been the best burner for DVD-R media.

Back to scans, well I have the complete opposite. I record everything at no higher than 4x (rarely @ 6x) , so you won't find the answers from me about higher speed burning. My 8x@4x MCC scans are down there with MXL, both either "+" or "-", they are almost constantly in 2 to 7 PI range burned on either one of my currently connected burners (DRX-500ULX's burns on top of that look more solid, prettier burned dye appearance) . Same goes for Verbatim DVD+R DL recorded with A09XL, the regular PI values are lower than 10 with usually some spike to about 25 (which is still great) at the first layer's outer edge.

On the contrary, TY, "+" or "-", are consistently giving me 20 to 50 PI range scans. But if I drop the scanning speed to 2x, then they are as good as MCC or MXL. But MCC and MXL are scanning great at any speed. So, I'm not sure why TY's are like that. TY CD-R's don't have this relatively small issue .

On a side note, Ricoh "+" discs has always been good to me, also with great playback compatibility (booktype set to DVD-ROM naturally) and ultra low PI scan numbers. I want to try their DL discs now.

[Hawseman]

Thanks for the reply.

Well, that just goes to show you....it's all relative to each person's total system.

Wow, I'm suprised to hear that the Sony beats your Pioneer for DVD-R media....hmmmmm. I'm with you, I prefer high quality to speed and mediocre quality. Although, I will burn MCC/MXL at rated speed with very good results. Truthfully, the MCC 8x's beat the MXL 8x's in scan quality fairly regularly.

My Pioneer A06 is semi-retired, but still active. I get some pretty good burn quality with the Maxell 4x & TY 4x from it. Though my NEC's can match it pretty close at 8x. The funny thing about my A06 is the unmatched quality that it burns Ricoh +R media.....strange for a Pioneer, but your findings are similar.

I do "amateur" video for my wife's business (not pron). I've never had any issues with people playing quality -R media in their players...so I mostly stick with it, too. I have 3 PC's, each with excellent -R burners. I usually have two burning and one scanning.

I still have a good supply of 4x media (not much Maxell left though) that I use with my Pioneer...It likewise has history. It was my first dual-format burner and has been a workhorse.....I want to bury it in the backyard myself someday.

----back on subject----
@SilverBlade,
Try the MCC's....they're definitely easier to find in local stores. I order retail printables online, but I think Verbatim DataLifePlus media is all MCC. (Rich and Edmund may want to chime in at this point about what to purchase).

[Edmund Blackadder]

Try the MCC's....they're definitely easier to find in local stores. I order retail printables online, but I think Verbatim DataLifePlus media is all MCC. (Rich and Edmund may want to chime in at this point about what to purchase).

I don't know if it's just me, but it seems that lately all the Verbatim DVD-R/+R's are MCC/MKM. They used to have other codes in the past (CMC, etc.), but right now, at least at Sam's Club, every kind of Verbatim I bought in the last 6 months was MCC, be that regular spindles or movie-case-boxed DVD's. Maybe Verbatim wasn't too happy with their OEM manufacturers and decided to do it all themselves (though CMC DVD+R spindles were actually very good). This however doesn't apply to CD-R spindles, which are most of the time somebody else's ID's, I think.

So, If you want MCC from retail, I think right now it's pretty much safe to buy any Verbatim DVD. They should all be MCC (or MKM for DL).

Cosmetically though I like Sonys the best. They are the most elegant and don't have any clutter. Also within the last year I had no complaints about compatibility from my customers neither about Sonys nor MCCs both "-" and "+" (with DVD-ROM booktype).

[richdvd]

I personally like the Verbatim MCC discs.
The BenQ 1620 REALLY likes these MCC (+R BTW).

[ROBERT BLACK]

I've had a spot of bad luck with my most recent MCC 50-count spindle, but all the brown top 8x MXLRG03 are burning perfectly so far.

Go figure.

The irony here is that I've had trouble with MCC Verbatim discs in the past as well. Yet, except for a slow initialization process in a DVD Recorder, no problems with the MXLRG03s. But I wonder about the long term reliability of these discs. The Ty/G02s their definitely not.