need opinions on blank media - Verbatim or Taiyo Yuden

[FulciLives]

I was just at BEST BUY yesterday and I saw something that I did not know existed ... 8x DVD+R DL discs ... made by Verbatim.

It was a 5-pack packaged in standard size CD jewel cases for $18.99 which is about $3.80 per disc (before tax).

Here is the box I saw (got this from the BESTY BUY website):



Are these any good?

I just got a new Pioneer DVR-115D and I've never ever burned onto Dual Layer discs so I'd like to give it a try.

- John "FulciLives" Coleman

[budz]

From what I've read at the PIONEER forum at Cdfreaks.com the PIONEER 115 is great at burning DL discs.

[lordsmurf]

What brand/model of burner? It might just be a sucky burner. Those exist.
I've used many burner in the past 7 years, and Verbatim/Mitsubishi never fails to perform UNLESS the burner itself is fubar.

Where do you buy your discs?
Anything with a perfect track record I have to get in on it.
All I know is, don't buy 'em for $25/100 from the Weekly Ad deal.

OfficeMax, 100 packs for $25.
Or Best Buy, 50 packs for $13.

Burned on OptiArc, Pioneer, BTC, Samsung, LG, NEC, LiteOn and another drive that I forget at the moment.

I mostly use the DVD+R discs, but the DVD-R are used too.

These are used for business too, so I'm not talking one pack, but a few hundred or few thousand discs per month minimum. For projects where branded media is desired and acceptable (as opposed to inkjet or pressed jobs).

At worst, I've had to trash 1-2 discs on a spindle sometimes, because there were visible scratches. Always the top couple of discs, or bottom couple of discs.

[dogra]

I prefer the Taiyo Yuden 8x DVD-R discs and I only ever buy them from RIMA.COM -- FulciLives

The same is true for me. I'm new to all this and have only burned about 75 DVDs so far.

All were Taiyo Yuden DVD-Rs, and not a single one ended up a coaster. I couldn't recommend TY discs more highly.

I burn the discs on my old iMac's SuperDrive (MATSHITA DVD-R UJ-825) using Toast Titanium.


To FulciLives: Let us know how those Verbatim DL discs you bought at Best Buy work out. I have a LaCie DL external burner that I might need to use occasionally for my bigger Double Feature discs.

[FulciLives]

To FulciLives: Let us know how those Verbatim DL discs you bought at Best Buy work out. I have a LaCie DL external burner that I might need to use occasionally for my bigger Double Feature discs.

I didn't actually buy them ... I just mentioned that I saw them at BEST BUY and was wondering if they were any good ... or not.

I wish Taiyo Yuden made DVD+R DL discs but I guess they don't ... bummer

- John "FulciLives" Coleman

[Seeker47]

I was just at BEST BUY yesterday and I saw something that I did not know existed ... 8x DVD+R DL discs ... made by Verbatim.

It was a 5-pack packaged in standard size CD jewel cases for $18.99 which is about $3.80 per disc (before tax).

Here is the box I saw (got this from the BESTY BUY website):

Nothing new -- I've seen those packs on the shelves of BB stores for at least the last couple years. I'm pretty sure that I've also seen some 5 or 10 packs of those (MIS, of course) that had an "up to 10x" rating on the box. They came out to about $4./disc. The need for those -- at a price like that -- escaped me . . . unless one was in a terrible hurry, and burning 'em at 6x or 8x would really make a difference.

[MilesAhead]

OfficeMax, 100 packs for $25.

Guess I'm unlucky because I tried Verbatim DVD+R 100 spindle on sale at
OfficeMax on 2 separate occasions and got a number of flawed discs both
times(the same 12x max burn while showing 16x support syndrome.)

I have yet to have a problem from an online store at @$.50 a disc.
About all I can do with these flawed discs it use them for disposable data
backup(volatile files that I don't intend to keep for long.)

As I say, one person's experience doesn't always translate to others.
Get what works for you.

What the other poster mentioned about being out-sourced to ProDisc makes
sense to me because I was having very good luck with ProDisc DVD+R 16x
until SuperMediaStore went dry. Then when they got more in, I started
getting these 12x burns with freezes if you try to burn @16x. If you set
the burn to 12x specifically, they seem to work ok. Still, makes me nervous
so I've moved to spending $.50 a disc now instead of $.32.

Discussing media is kind of like arguing about car models. Chevy used
to make this piece of crap called a Vega. That thing came off production
either impossible to align, or impossible to knock out of alignment short
of a head-on collision @80mph. So if you talked to an owner who got a
"good" one, it's the best thing since sliced bread. 98% of the other
customers who bought it had a different reaction!!! So if it works for
you, then you love it. If it don't, you don't. I don't doubt your experience.
But I'm shelling out my money, so I have to go with mine.

[maldb]

I just bought a 100 pack of Verbatim 16X -R inkjet printables at Sam's Club ($30) and decided to do a comparison between them and the 8X TY printables. They were burned within minutes of each other - same file and settings. Here are the results:

[maldb]

Here's the TY

[maldb]

As you can see, the MIJ TY doesn't look as good as the MIT Verbatim. Both discs play fine - the #s are way different though. I'll update my FW and see if the #s improve.

[FulciLives]

LOL I haven't seen the 'ol NERO CD-DVD-SPEED graph thing in ages.

A blast from the past ...

- John "FulciLives" Coleman

[SCDVD]

maldb, You are missing a very important element in your testing. I see that you are using a Pioneer 110. The 110 was made before any of the media that you are testing was introduced. That means there is no provision for an optimal write strategy to insure that the media is written properly. Firmware updates for the 110 haven't been made available for quite a long time so that means there will never be an optimal write strategy for newer media when burned in a 110. Your testing is revealing something alright but not what you think it is. If you use the 110 to test burn with, your testing is only showing what happens without the proper write strategy. It is telling you nothing about the quality of the media that you are testing. For $40 or less, you will save yourself a lot of misery if you buy a new Pioneer burner.

[FulciLives]

I just bought a Pioneer DVR-115D and it was only $25.99 + shipping (which was not much) so a new DVD burner is really cheap these days!

- John "FulciLives" Coleman

[Seeker47]

I just bought a Pioneer DVR-115D and it was only $25.99 + shipping (which was not much) so a new DVD burner is really cheap these days!

Which really makes me wonder: how can they make this sort of technology item that cheap, and have it be any good ? (Even paying negligible wages . . . ) If you paid only $26., there was considerable markup in places, from the mfr. to the retail.

I mean, it's not a mousetrap, where the technology is also negligible, and the raw materials set you back about 39 cents.

[budz]

As you can see, the MIJ TY doesn't look as good as the MIT Verbatim. Both discs play fine - the #s are way different though. I'll update my FW and see if the #s improve.

First of all PIONEER does NOT support dvd quality scanning. Therefore what you've posted doesn't mean anything. If you want dvd quality scanning done with those VERBATIM discs then use a LITEON or BENQ 1640, 1650 & 1655 dvd burner to scan. Also updating your firmware will do nothing with regards to your quality scanning.

[OleTexCajun]

Been using TY +R (from RIMA) and Verbatim +R SL [(Japan, Singapore,Taiwan, (NO INDIA!)] for 5 years in various models NEC, Liteon, Plextor, Pioneer, and BenQ....as well as 4 different Toshiba Notebooks.
Made approx 5000 burns that play back in any and all the above PLUS every Pioneer, Toshiba, Phillips, Coby, Dynex, and Sony DVD player of mine, friends, and family so far!
I will NOW only buy RIMA. No more Verbatim.

[Faustus]

As for Taiyo Yuden ... I say that any model/make of DVD burner that CANNOT burn well to Taiyo Yuden is junk. Period.

I agree 101%. In my time I've only seen very few piece of hardware that had issues with TYs. I'd be suspect of hardware that doesn't work well with it.



FIrst time I heard of Yaiyo was WAY back in the day when the audio place my cousin worked for would use nothing except TY gold CD-Rs for production.

[wtsinnc]

After more than four years of near-perfect results with Verbatim +/- Rs, I am now experiencing severe problems with the latest incarnation of their discs (G 03/made in Taiwan). Last night, I had nine consecutive failures despite switching burners, burning software, and even after switching to another hard drive. In an earlier post this year, I related my having problems with the new +R DLs (8x). My burners are not the reason for these errors as they all have been updated to the latest firmware revision(s) and burn flawlessly using either Maxell or Sony DVD-5 media. I refer to an earlier post describing mixed results within the same batch of these new Verbatims and wonder how much longer I can afford to remain a user. Certainly, they remain the only viable choice with dual-layer discs, but even there, the quality has deteriorated noticeably. My only known experience with TY media was several years ago using Fuji branded 4x DVD-Rs (G 02) in my set top recorder; they had the best overall performance in terms of playback compatibility.

I have about 120 remaining Verbatim -Rs purchased from Mega Media Mall and Newegg and will continue to use them as best I can, but today, I am ordering a 50 count spindle of TY 16x -Rs for evaluation.

[FulciLives]

I don't know how true this is but I've heard some people say that the 8x DVD-R Taiyo Yuden discs are *slightly* better than the 16x DVD-R Taiyo Yuden discs. I've used both but only a very few of the 16x DVD-R discs ... mostly I buy the 8x DVD-R because they are cheaper and I never burn faster than 6x anyways.

I have also heard that the 16x DVD+R Taiyo Yuden discs are better than the 16x DVD-R discs and that the 16x DVD+R Taiyo Yuden discs are just as good as the 8x DVD-R Taiyo Yuden discs.

Not wanting to "muddy" the waters but these are things I've heard people say.

Personally I don't like +R discs. Personally I don't like burning above 6x speed. So I stick with the 8x DVD-R Taiyo Yuden discs which I only ever buy from RIMA.COM

I do miss the "old" days of looking through packs of FUJI DVD-R discs and trying to find MADE IN JAPAN which was the sign that you were getting Taiyo Yuden discs.

In fact when I was at BEST BUY they had no FUJI media at all ... no CD and no DVD.

What the hell is that all about ???

Poor Fuji

- John "FulciLives" Coleman

[budz]

I don't know how true this is but I've heard some people say that the 8x DVD-R Taiyo Yuden discs are *slightly* better than the 16x DVD-R Taiyo Yuden discs. I've used both but only a very few of the 16x DVD-R discs ... mostly I buy the 8x DVD-R because they are cheaper and I never burn faster than 6x anyways.

I have also heard that the 16x DVD+R Taiyo Yuden discs are better than the 16x DVD-R discs and that the 16x DVD+R Taiyo Yuden discs are just as good as the 8x DVD-R Taiyo Yuden discs.

Not wanting to "muddy" the waters but these are things I've heard people say.

Personally I don't like +R discs. Personally I don't like burning above 6x speed. So I stick with the 8x DVD-R Taiyo Yuden discs which I only ever buy from RIMA.COM

I do miss the "old" days of looking through packs of FUJI DVD-R discs and trying to find MADE IN JAPAN which was the sign that you were getting Taiyo Yuden discs.

In fact when I was at BEST BUY they had no FUJI media at all ... no CD and no DVD.

What the hell is that all about ???

Poor Fuji

- John "FulciLives" Coleman

Actually it's the TY 8x DVD-/+R media that's favored over the 16x DVD+/-R. The TY 8x speed media tend to burn better than the 16x speed. It would really depend on what brand/model dvd burner that's being used. Which is why I own so many dvd burners. Some dvd burners can burn the 8x spd media at 12x, 16x & even 18x using MEDIA CODE SPEED EDIT. I buy only the TY DVD+R 8x spindles from rima.com.

I still have TY "MADE IN JAPAN" FUJI & MAXELL 4x speed DVD-R media in jewel cases and a few spindles.
You wouldn't want the FUJI media now since they outsource to RITEK.