Primary Concerns About "Cheapo" Media?

[CobraPilot]

In another thread, someone asked about using cheap media, to which there are always responses of "don't do it", "use only quality media", etc.

Valid advice, to be sure, especially since some "quality" brand names have reduced their quality, as various comments suggest.

However, I'm curious about where the concerns lie, based on individual experience, statistics, benchmarks, etc.

For example, for those who express their opinions, is the overall concern 50% because of initial bad burns (coasters) and 50% long-term archiving; 25% initial, 75% long-term; 95% initial, 5% long-term? Third or fourth concerns?

[Beavis]

I rarely had a bad (with errors) initial burn.... but I've had plenty of super cheap DVD blanks that are only a few years old and stored well, that do not read at all anymore. None of them were meant to store anything important, but it's a good lesson for the stuff that does count.

[Constant Gardener]

I've had a few - very few - "cheapo" discs that would not read properly, in some drives, after several years of storage in a cool, dark, and dry location. They verified fine after burning.

[adalect]

Well, the only "cheapo" media I ever used were Memorex CD-RWs. I don't burn much though.

The failure in the discs lied in the third year of usage. I already said this in another fourm, but I had about 5 discs. One had its dye turn completely black after extensive usage in the past 3 years. I couldn't work after that but I was satisfied with its life.

Two of them had some parts of the dye "chip" off. The dye was on the reverse side of the label of the disc, and it started to flake off. Sort of annoying, since now I can't use the full 700MB of the disc. But I sort of noticed subtle gradual chipping months in advance, so I could have been prepared to back up any important stuff on other media if I wanted too.

One disappeared so I can't comment on it.

The fifth one is having the same fate as the first one: its dye is gradually blackening. But I have nothing important on that, so its OK.
___________

I also had a failure in a HP Disc. Not a "cheapo" necessarily, but my pictures on it couldn't be read on a DVD-/+RW drive. It worked fine on the CD-RW drive on my older computer though. So I think its the individual burners: old stuff works with old stuff and new stuff works with new stuff. The same thing happened to another of my Maxwell CD-R backup of a game. It couldn't be read on the newer DVD-/+RW drive on the newer computer. How annoying.
___________

So in conclusion: stuff is just stuff to me. If the product looks "bad" or "fragile" in my eyes, I avoid it. If it is outrageously expensive, I think its probably overpriced anyway. I use my own judgment, like the judgment you use when buying apples in a store. I pick what "looks reasonable" regardless of origin and such.

I hope this helps.

[Krispy Kritter]

Longevity. When I initially started burning DVD's, I purchased Memorex SL media because it was much cheaper. Within the first year, several of those discs were no longer readable. Since then, it's Verbatim or Taio Yuden. I've also had good luck with TDK DL media, so far anyway.

[hech54]

I don't trust any RW media......CD or DVD....no matter who makes it.....especially for long term storage of important material.
The only CD-Rs I've had "go bad" were because of the adhesive used on the paper sleeves (top, fold-over thing) I stored them in.
The CDs became discolored and out of the 10 discs, two could not be completely read. I only retrieved about half of the material from each disc.

[fritzi93]

Just my own experience:

1) With phase-change RW media you *will* lose data if stored for long periods. Doesn't seem to matter what brand, I've had it happen with Ritek, Verbatim, any others. So I don't do that any more.

2) I use Verbatims for data backups and anything important and/or not easily replaceable.

But for things easily replaceable (like BD-5 backups of my Blu-Rays), I've used Memorex (gasp) CMC-MAG lightscribe discs for nearly two years now with no failures out of ~ 100 discs. Evidently my LG burner works well with them, and I burn at 8x. Hey, they're cheap and no big deal if they crap out eventually. None have so far.

I also have a fair number of DVD backups, some getting near 10 years old. Various discs, Ritek, Ricoh, CMC, MCC, etc. All stored properly and I can recall only a couple that went bad, hard to tell if it was because of scratches or...

3) Sticky labels are a real bad idea.

[lordsmurf]

This is already documented in the media forum.
For further reading, try the media guides: http://www.digitalfaq.com/guides/media/index.htm

Longevity is not a concern for a decade or two. Discs don't randomly die in a few years/months.
Explained this here: https://forum.videohelp.com/threads/319381-low-resolution?p=1980561#post1980561

Initial burn failure/errors is most common issue. (Most people don't notice, later claiming a disc "died")
Being poor reflectivity/readability is next issue of concern.

Crap media = crap experience. Only buy the best blank DVDs.

[Kerry56]

By the way, for those who have been using and recommending Verbatim as very high quality media, it seems that Verbatim is reducing or possibly even eliminating their AZO dvds from the market. They are being replaced with "Life Series" Verbatim, using CMC mid codes. It is still possible to find their dvds using the AZO dye, but they may become less common in the local brick and mortar stores.
This has not been announced by Verbatim, just observed by a few of us over at myce.com. http://club.myce.com/f33/death-verbatim-311104/#post2512707

Also, lordsmurf, there have been cases of good burns going bad. Talk to those who suffered through this using Ritek G05 disks.

[lordsmurf]

They are being replaced with "Life Series" Verbatim, using CMC mid codes.

No. Right now, this is just speculation on your part. While Value Series and Life Series have been added, there's no reason to yet assume MCC AZO media is disappearing or being replaced.

Also, lordsmurf, there have been cases of good burns going bad. Talk to those who suffered through this using Ritek G05 disks.

No. People never have adequate data to prove the disc went bad. It's just guessing on their part.

[Kerry56]

And just who is speculating without proof now lordsmurf? Have you checked the local supplies? Have you looked at the mid codes used on the Life Series? Have you seen AZO on the Life Series labels? I haven't said that the AZO are going to be gone absolutely, nor have the users in that thread. We are merely reporting what we have seen.

No. People never have adequate data to prove the disc went bad. It's just guessing on their part.

When the disk plays perfectly, then does not play at all a few weeks or months after the burn with Ritek G05, that is quite a lot of proof. And that doesn't even take into account scans before and after. No guesswork at all. You are simply wrong on this issue and have been many times in the past.

[VegasBud]

In another thread, someone asked about using cheap media...I'm curious about where the concerns lie...

One factor would be the true cost of the media. Since an unuseable disk has no value, the true cost of media is the number of useable disks divided by the price for all the disks. As the number of useable disks decreases, the true cost increases. At the point where the true cost of "cheap" media exceeds the true cost of "good" media, better "bang for the buck" is obtained by avoiding the cheap media.

Unfortunately, the number of useable disks isn't always immediately obvious. Dvds (including dvdr) are made much more reliable by the use of error correction. That's a really good thing, and we're all very happy it's there. There's just one little problem, in that the transparent implementation of error correction prevents you from really knowing how much of the error correction is already committed to fixing existing errors, and how much is still available to fix damage that hasn't occurred yet. A disk may appear to burn (and verify) fine, but may actually have so many burn errors (invisibly being offset by error correction) that very little (if any) error correction is left uncommitted. In that case, even a (subsequently acquired) small scratch could result in uncorrectable error(s)...which may, or may not, make the disk unuseable.

Which brings us to another factor...the nature of the contents of the disk. Critical, irreplaceable digital data has no tolerance for uncorrectable error. Dvd-video disks, on the other hand, have a significantly higher tolerance for uncorrectable error before becoming apparent...depending, of course, on exactly where the uncorrectable error exists. Since most of a dvd-video disk's storage space is used for audio and video, the probability is higher that any damage would occur in that area, and have reduced effect on useability. Conversely, the critical portions of a dvd-video disk (IFOs, for example) are contained in much smaller areas of the disk's storage space, which means the probability is proportionately smaller that an uncorrectable error would occur in that section.

Another factor would be the value placed on the contents of the disk. Is it worth an extra five cents, ten cents, or twenty cents to maximize the probability you'll be able to accurately retrieve the entire contents of that disk at a later date?

I do understand that some people have more "stuff" to burn than money to spend on it, and minimizing the cost is worth the additional risk introduced. In my case, however, where everything I burn represents time I spent (and effort I don't want to be forced to repeat), I sleep better at night knowing that I've taken every precaution to safeguard my (time) investment. What's right for you may not be right for me, and what's right for me may not be right for you. Everybody has to make their own decisions. The best you can do is make it an informed decision.

[lordsmurf]

AWhen the disk plays perfectly, then does not play at all a few weeks or months after the burn with Ritek G05, that is quite a lot of proof.

That's not proof of any kind. That's just guesswork on the part of the person, and too much faith in the hardware in use. This is easily debunked as myth and unreliable.

VegasBud actually just explained some of the theory behind why "playback testing" is unreliable, between handling/storage and error correction.

[VegasBud]

In my previous post, when I said:

Since an unuseable disk has no value, the true cost of media is the number of useable disks divided by the price for all the disks.

I should have said:

Since an unuseable disk has no value, the true cost of media is the price for all the disks divided by the number of useable disks.

[lordsmurf]

For example:
$15 cheap discs x 50% good = $30 for spindle
$25 good discs x 99% good = $24.75 for spindle

Very simple stuff.
However, many people are idiots, when it comes to economics, and don't understand this.