VHS tapes to DVD-R & Cheap DVD-R discs

[FusionMafia]

Hello everyone...
I'm buying an DVD-R writer just to transfer and organise my whole VHS collection to DVD'S. I mainly have cartoons like SP, Simpsons and Futurama.

So my #1 question is: How many hours can I expect to fit on one DVD-R disc. The recordings are not very good quality so if I use lower bitrate/quality when burning, how much can I fit?

#2 Question: I live in Finland and here the Pioneer-a03 costs about $800 and blank DVD-Rs cost about $20. I'm planning to order big amount from web but cannot find anything cheap. Do you have any hints about the good places to buy? I'm planning to buy the writer from http://www.nxgenstore.com/ which was not the cheapest but seemed reliable.

Thank you for your help!

[damnim]

First get your DVD-R's from here http://store.yahoo.com/cd-recordable-dot-com/index.html. 2.95 a disc.

Second go here and do a price search for the pioneer ao3 http://www.nextag.com/Home~0zmainz7-htm. I got mine for 415.00 deliverd.

Third and most importantly be scientific in your process. You will have to develop a plan to record your VHS. Experiment with a small amout of recorded video. Write down and keep samples of the various procedures. Once you have found the one that works you should be able to let the equipment do the work while your at work or sleeping.

You should spend the most time with experimentation then there is not much time invoved after that.

[FusionMafia]

Thanks for quick reply and the links!

## THE CHEAP DVD-Rs
The DVD-Rs are very cheap on the place you mentioned. Is there any difference in quality between those and for example TDK DVD-R? I read somewhere that the cheap ones would be good only for data, not playing well on standalone player.

## DOUBLE SIDE DISCS
What is the double sided disc they are advertising on the same site? Can you burn the double side disc with the pioneer writer? If yes, can you copy a full dvd movie to it? One layer two one side i mean.

## THE VHS BURNING
Actually the reason I asked is that I don't have any experience about DVD burning as I don't have the burner yet but I'm very experienced with video editing in general and VCD/SVCD production, so I know the testing and trying different settings will be important.
But is there any big difference between the maximum quality and for example the quality that allows 4 hours to one disc? Just asking because if I burn for example my Spouthparks and other cartoons I don't want to burn DVDs with only two episodes. The VHS is already poor quaity so i think the best settings are not essential.
I have over 200 hours of tapes to transfer so.....

[jaw2957]

Yes, the double sided discs will work in the A03. Not sure on the quality. Before you get started, I would urge you to encode all your vhs to 352x480 dvd. This is still dvd standard, and you can use much lower bit rates without getting alot of blockiness in CCE. You could easily fit 5 hours and once you play around with it, you can probably fit more!