No more DupEZ at Rima?! Need help!

[Bryanmc]

I've been using the DupEZ (sony) disks from RIMA for a while now. I'm just now getting low on my supplies and went to go order more.

They don't list them!

I hate trying out new media. Anyone know where I can get these disks or suggestions for something else?

I need injet printable DVD-Rs.

Thanks.


Bryan

[VinnySem]

I've had a lot of correspondence with Rima, those DupEZ are due back in stock some time this month. Apparently they are a hot item and in heavy demand.

If you want to try another good disk they sell, get the Samsungs. They're almost double the price of the DupEZ, but their quality is excellent. They have both silver top and white printable.

[Bryanmc]

Thanks.

I've got a project that I have to get out to about 30 people and have just realized that I'm down to my last 15 DupEZ disks so I need something right away.

I'll check into those Samsungs.

[LanEvo7]

get the regular dupezs. It works just as well, and it burns at 2x with the firmware hack.

[Bryanmc]

What are the regular ones?

I've got to have injet printable.

[Bix]

Are these legit Sony or forged?

[disturbed1]

What are the regular ones?

I've got to have injet printable.

why not the Ritek injet's at $1.30

or the Samungs as posted above for $1.50

Not as cheap as the Dup's but perhaps a better quality.

[Bryanmc]

Are these legit Sony or forged?

I don't know the difference.

They just said Sony when I ran the test program.

[LanEvo7]

The Silver topped ones are the regular ones. I don't understand why people are freaking out to get the "SONY" ones when the LD ones work just as well and burn at 2x with the hack. I doubt if even the "SONY" ones are legit sony's. Why would sony market their products under another company's name?

[disturbed1]

The Silver topped ones are the regular ones. I don't understand why people are freaking out to get the "SONY" ones when the LD ones work just as well and burn at 2x with the hack. I doubt if even the "SONY" ones are legit sony's. Why would sony market their products under another company's name?

Agreed. If people are that worried about Media ID's, perhaps they should just buy the branded discs.

[defense]

The Silver topped ones are the regular ones. I don't understand why people are freaking out to get the "SONY" ones when the LD ones work just as well and burn at 2x with the hack. I doubt if even the "SONY" ones are legit sony's. Why would sony market their products under another company's name?

It's very easy to understand. The LD's are much worse then the Sony branded ACCU's when burning towards the outer end of the disks. MANY people have experienced this including myself, and I even did one test where THREE ACCU "LD's" of the Perfect Storm, when encoded was 4.35 GB's. Towards the ending chapters the disk froze in BOTH my standalone and DVD ROM.

I threw in a SONY branded ACCU disk and BAMMM...perfect all the way through. The LD's are good as long as you burn 4 GB's or less of data. If you burn more then it's a crap shoot...it may work..it may not. In addition, the SONY branded ACCU's have NEVER in well over 150 burns has a SINGLE issue with anything. Too bad I bragged about them on here..the price has gone up .15 cents due to demand being so high for them.

As far as why "SONY" would have their name on ACCU disks or DUPEZ disks is very simple. I mentioned it in another post and basically it allows the original manufacturer to use a reputable name such as SONY while at the same time, giving SONY a percentage for each disk sold. Sony doesn't have to drip a drop of sweat because they don't produce the disks themselves, but they still profit. Sony is the biggest electronics giant for a reason, and they aren't going to allow their name etched into crappy disks. My theory has proven correctly on well over 150 burned SONY "ACCU" branded disks...so it makes me no difference when I see people want to continue to spend $2.00+ per disk when I spend less then 1 dollar and get the same results each and every single time.

[LanEvo7]

I've burned over twenty DupEZ's silver tops all the way until the end and there hasn't been any problems. Maybe its different than the accus. Besides its pretty hard to get SONY discs now anyways. Meritline and CDRDVDRMEDIA doesn't carry the white topped accus anymore and rima doesn't have the printables anymore. I've noticed that the DupEZs do not have the same exact media code as the accus*(edit). They do have the same media code as the compusa brand generic discs. I don't think compusa would slap their name on any crappy generic discs.

[defense]

I've burned over twenty DupEZ's silver tops all the way until the end and there hasn't been any problems. Maybe its different than the accus. Besides its pretty hard to get SONY discs now anyways. Meritline and CDRDVDRMEDIA doesn't carry the white topped accus anymore and rima doesn't have the printables anymore. I've noticed that the DupEZs do not have the same exact media code as the older riteks. They do have the same media code as the compusa brand generic discs. I don't think compusa would slap their name on any crappy generic discs.

20 is a good number for a fair assessment, so being that you haven't had any issues, that's good news for people looking for more media. I was pretty surprised that "disturbed" mentioned that if people were concerned about media ID's then they should purchase branded disks, when we both concluded that not only were the SONY id's excellent for BOTH ACCU and DUPEZ, but the LD's were not nearly as good.

I believe he even posted that the LD's are about as poor as Princo's. We were just a couple of the people who had this experience with "LD's." However, to this day, I have never seen a post where anyone has said that their "SONY" branded ACCU disks had issues. That's why I say to anyone, go with what works for you. Even reputable companies are now starting to outsource the manufacturing of their disks. With this fact as well as these phony media id's, it can be difficult to find out what is real and what isn't.

I do agree with what Disturbed is saying and that is that if people are so paranoid and concerned with unbranded disks, then they should go out and buy Pioneer or Apple and don't cause unnecessary stress to themselves. I was just surprised he didn't mention that the ACCU or DUPEZ LD's and SONY's are definitely different.


Anyway, as far as the phony media id's go...I think the best method is to just track these online companies that sell these phony disks...report them on this site... and not purchase from them in the future. As far as the compusa disks go...i'm not familiar with them, but I've read they seem to be very good.

[disturbed1]

I do agree with what Disturbed is saying and that is that if people are so paranoid and concerned with unbranded disks, then they should go out and buy Pioneer or Apple and don't cause unnecessary stress to themselves. I was just surprised he didn't mention that the ACCU or DUPEZ LD's and SONY's are definitely different.

Yep, that's what I meant.

LD's aren't that great, but I do agree with defense that the sony's are great.

You should continue to use what works best for you. Everyone has different experiences. I don't take 100% of the comments to heart, but respect that persons experience with his/her stuff. Sometimes I have the same experience, sometimes not. Just too many factors in play, like burner, burning app, authoring, stand alone etc........

I buy the DupEZ's when I need a lower priced disc. I haven't checked the media IDs for a few month's. But, the silver top's were all LD in 2 50 packs, and the printable's were all SONY in 2 50 packs. Do they mix 'em up? Don't know don't care :P But they prob. do.

But defense knows his ACCU's and I'd take his word about this or that media being crap or not. I don't believe he's just some joker, like some self pro-claimed "Professionals" on this board. Plus he always backs up his statements with facts.

We had a thread about the DupEZ and ACCU a while back, that has some good info in it. We booth came to the same conclusion that the LD's were less than great, while the SONY's where close enough to flawless

About the fake IDs, buy a small sample and try out. I'm burning through a 500 pack of "Unbranded Maxell" now. Haven't decided if they're good or bad. Some have been great, but others show problems after 4 gig, some show problems inside the first track. But I only paid $0.79 a disc, so I didn't expect too much. If it was constantly bad at 4 gig (like most Princo and LD), that wouldn't be too bad, as I'd know what to expect. Not knowing if it's going to be the first track, last track, or no tracks, isn't good in my book. They're defintly not the same quality as branded Maxell though.

[LanEvo7]

Just on a side note, Meritline/CDRDVDRMEDIA doesn't sell those "SONY" Accus anymore right?

[VinnySem]

Yeah, what disturbed1 and defense said 8)

My media of choice are the BeAlls, mainly for their amazing compatability. I think you could play those with a Maglite and an electric mixer.

When Rima finally gets those white topped DupEZ back in, I'm going to grab 100 or so, just to around. Rima sent me some samples before they ran out of stock (apparently these are very popular and there is a heavy backorder), they worked fantastic.

On another note, regarding the state of blank DVD media in general, the days are coming when we'll be able to buy high quality, branded media for less than a buck apiece. I would venture a guess that the DVD recording market will follow the same suit as CD recording. I remember the days when the only low-cost media was the plain silver media that was packaged in shrink wrap only (not even a spindle) and the only labelling on it was a price tag. Nowadays you can get Sony or Imation or any name-brand quality disk for $20-$35 for a spindle of 100. While I don't see DVD+-R media dropping below 50 cents a piece until Blu-Ray comes out, better days for DVD media are ahead.

[defense]

@Disturbed, I figured you didn't mention the difference between the LD's and SONY's is because it has been mentioned on a couple of other occasions. Specifically, in that post where, as you said, we both concluded why the Sony's were better.

When I first started burning disks I was hesitant to purchase unbranded disks because there wasn't much of a consensus on what was good or not. I tried Verbatim DVD-R, Verbatim DVD+R, TDK and Maxell. All burned flawleslly with the exception of the VERBATIM DVD+R's. I bought 2 spindles of the Verbatim DVD+R's and they may of just been defective, because all of the DVD-R's burned perfectly.

After some research on unbranded disks I decided on ACCU and was fortunate (without knowing anything at the time) half were LD's and half were SONY. I also noticed that the SONY's had a "bar code" on the cake box, while the LD's had no label. Coincidence? I didn't think so. That's why when I ordered my next batch I specifically called and asked for the SONY branded disks.

After some discussion, they told me they couldn't guarantee anything, but I asked them to really try, and they told me they would. I let them know I was placing my order online immediately, and I would request those "SONY" ACCU's in the order. Anyway, when I got my order, BOTH 50 pack spindles were Sony and BOTH had the Bar code on the cake box.

It's almost time for me to re-order, so i'm hoping I can do the same thing this time. What Disturbed said is right, I don't B.S and believe me when I say that if these disks were crappy or didn't play right...I would be forced to purchase Maxell or TDK or Verbatim....because I don't live in Fantasy Land and just becuase I really would like to purchase great inexpensive disks...if they weren't great, I wouldn't sugar coat it like many do.

But why would I spend two to three times as much on disks when I'm getting perfect results with the ones I have now? If my disks "vaporize" in a few years...then I'll come here and stand corrected...lol.

@Disturbed, I know you burn a great deal of disks, so your statements on media are on the money...my question is being that you purchase so many different types of media, what do you feel with your expertise is your "best" media...price not being a factor? And what do you consider your "best" inexpensive media, price being a factor? And why do you feel one is better then the other?

Thanks in advance


@LanEvo, CDR/Meritline does sell the Sony branded ACCU's but they also still sell the LD's. Apparently, they don't have the "ink jet printable" SONY's now, and have a choice between Silver top and Blue top. I've never seen the blue top, but the Silver top Sony's were just as great as the White top, ink jet printable. And believe it or not, while most like the ink jet printable better....because I "don't" put labels on my disks, I actually prefer the silver tops because my DVD Marker's tip gets all bent up and frizzed on the white tops, but writes super smoothly on the silver tops.

[disturbed1]

For brand name discs I buy the no marking Verbatium, and Mitsui. I wouldn't say they're better than something like Apple, but I've never had a problem, and there's no markings so I can thermal print. I've found that just about any disc that's $2 or more tends to be top notch.

For cheapies, I used to be a die hard Ritek guy. But I'm tired of the out of stock messages every few weeks. The Accu/DupEZ, and now Maxell Unbranded are what I've been using. Hell I may go back to Princo since the Dup's and Accu's are out of stock too Maybe not.

I picked up my Maxell Unbranded for $395 a 500 pack. I wouldn't pay more than $1 for these. The quality control isn't there. The glue runs out of the sides on some, it's worse than Ritek discs. But they burn, and they play 97% of the time. The color is a little lighter than Ritek, but darker than the LD/SONY, and see through like the BeAll's. Better than Princo, but that's about it.

I may grab some Optodisc just since TX talks highly about them. If they don't work well, I'll fly over his house and wing 'em through the windows j/k just kidding of course. I have about 25-30 Optodisc DVD-RAM, and they've worked well for about a year now. I can get the silver ones for about $0.75 in 500 packs, but $0.82 for a 50 pack.

I've also been playing with Gigastorage media. I've had two batches, 1 was flawless, the other isn't suitable for data storage. One company sells them under the Universal Name, but at $1.49 each. I only paid $8 a ten pack through my distributor, but they no longer carry Gigastorage, and I ain't paying $1.49. I've talked with Meritline about picking up the line as an OEM maker, they said they might if they (Gigastorage) can suply the high volume needed. Every retailer is having problems with the disc makers not producing enough blanks.

My next order is going to be a package of Taiyo Uden, Optodisc, and maybe DupEZ or Ritek depends on what's in stock. I'm sitting on 700+ Verbatiums that should last for a little while. The Taiyo are $.20 cheaper a disc compared to Verbatium, so I thought I'd give 'em a go.

Blue top Accu? Sounds interesting.

[defense]

@Disturbed, thanks for that detailed post. I haven't heard of Gigastorage...but it sounds somewhat worthy from what you state. I like consistency though, and not the fact that one batch is much better then another. Being that the ACCU price is continuously increasing...I was thinking about Maxell because I know the 10 I purchased a while back all burned flawlessly, but they were about $4 a disk at Office Depot. The price has dropped a little but I know I can get those unbranded Maxell's much cheaper.

My question now is that being you have given the Maxell unbranded a 97% success ratio, which ain't too bad for the price...would you consider those unbranded Maxell's better then the DUPEZ SONY media ID disks? I'm still at 100% with the SONY ACCU's and I don't want to jinx anything, but the ONLY way I would consider another brand of disk is if I couldn't get another order of ALL SONY ACCU's.

I've been lucky thus far, but I am prepared to switch to Rima or somewhere else and get "consistent" disks...meaning that I KNOW what i'm purchasing and don't have to worry about phony media id's or whether the disks are SONY or LD. If I get the LD's, I will be very hesitant to burn more then 4 GB's and go over the entire disk with a fine tooth comb.

I may grab some Optodisc just since TX talks highly about them. If they don't work well, I'll fly over his house and wing 'em through the windows j/k just kidding of course.

Of course you should purchase those Optodisks..are you freakin' nuts man? You got a professional giving their professional opinion for free....you better take it while you can!

Don't sweat the fact that they have on numberous occasions bashed "CHEAP" media...and said APPLE AND PIONEER are the BEST....just recently realizing that APPLE wasn't manufactured by them....and of course....you know that in the world of Digital media..PRICE does make a difference...so Disturbed..please stop buying CHEAP JUNK! As far as the window goes....i'm sure you were just joking...but i'm sure they've been a victim of a "Charles Barkley..throw you out the window situation" before.

Regarding those blue top ACCU's...CDRmedia had them listed...now they say that all ACCU's are once again out of stock until today. I personally don't care about how the disk looks....and even though these white tops are smooth looking...I prefer the silver tops because their smoother to write on with my DVD marker. Anyway, the blue tops are probabaly "smooth" on top...wouldn't mind gettin' a order of them. I'll check back later to see if they are back in stock today like they are supposed to be.

When you get a chance..let me know how you rate the unbranded Maxells against the DUPEZ Sony's. What is your "approximate" ratio with those SONY DUPEZ disks and about how many have you burned?

[disturbed1]

Of course you should purchase those Optodisks..are you freakin' nuts man? You got a professional giving their professional opinion for free....you better take it while you can!

That's not right

I like the Sony Dup's much better, more consistant (they always work :P ). I'd try a 25 pack or so if I was you. If you have to pay more for Unbranded Maxell's, may not be not worth it.
They aren't the same as the branded , had to make sure everyone saw that. The branded Maxells are flawless, these do have minor flaws. The over usage of glue is the most apparent.

The overall coaster ratio is small, about 7 complete coasters out of 400. But I'm used to 1-3 coasters in 2000 with Verbatium, and 4-6 out of 2000 Ritek. I can't give an accurate count on the DupEZ, cause some were LD01, and some Sony, but it was on par with Ritek with both combined, maybe a little less/more.

Funny thing is, most of the coasters from Ritek and others, are caused by packing/shipping, and warehouse employee handling. The Maxell coasters were purely bad media, mainly uneven dye coating.

If you have a way to always get the Sony Accu ( ) don't fix what isn't broke.

[defense]

Thanks again for the response...that is the ratio I expected you to say regarding the Dupez. I agree, and I shouldn't fix what isn't broken, but I always try to keep a "safety valve" plan in case cdr/meritline change their business habits. That's hasn't been the case to this point and I know I can go to Rima at any time and be satisfied. Unfortunately, I don't have a "sure shot" method of getting the Sony's, but i'm gonna try and do what I did the last time, which is call first, get a name, and put that name on the "notes" section of my order. Hopefully it will work again, because I haven't had a single coaster with the SONY's in 150 burns.

I also am going to get a small order from Rima just to see how how that pans out. I expect it will work smoothly. If you happen to try even more types of media...please report your results...you burn so many disks that if you can find a brand that works as flawlessly as those SONY's, while being about the same price as well as being consistent with what you order..meaning...no "LD" or "SONY"...just "Brand" then it will take the suspense out of each order.

[LanEvo7]

I have gotten a 100% success rate with the Silver topped DupEZ(LD, 20+ discs) and the white topped DupEZ(SONY, 10 discs). Both burns all the way to the edge without skipping, break up, etc. I've also tried the blue topped Optodiscs and the Gold topped optodiscs, both work great all the way until the edge also. I am currently using the gold topped optodiscs because the DupEZs were sold out at Rima. Optodiscs does have a minor issues though. Sometimes in the movies the sound crackles a bit, nothing is wrong with the picture though. It doesn't seem to be because its near the end of the disc either, because it was fairly early in the movie. It only happened with some of the discs, so I am still trying to figure out if it really is the disc or just the movie itself.
Regarding the comment about TX, I have doubts about his suggestions. He claimed that Apple discs were better than TDK and Maxell(branded), when they are all made by the same company.

[VinnySem]

LanEvo: Are you able to burn the gold topped optodisks @ 2X? If so, with which burner? I used to have a Sony dual format, and it tried to burn them @ 2X, and would fail like 80% through the burn. They would burn successfully @ 1X. I switched back to my old trusty Pioneer A04, and I want to find a cheapoid media to complement the Samsung BeAlls I regularly use.

Is anyone using the Accu/DupEZ Sony disks burning them on a Pioneer drive? If so, can you successfully burn @ 2X?

Thanks for all the info.

[defense]

Well, it seems like once again cdrdvdrmedia.com has these ACCU's back in stock "today" as they said was expected. The only thing is now they don't seem to offer the "ink jet printable" white tops, and they aren't currently offering those "BLUE TOPS" I saw them list a couple of weeks ago either. Something else interesting is that they are now referring to the silver tops as "blank silver tops."

They had just referred to them before as "silver tops" and although "blank" is more specific to the disk, I find it interesting that the site lists the disks as "BLANK Silver tops" for orders up to a 300 quantity, while more then that, the color is listed specifically as just "silver." It would seem like they would be the same thing and it wouldn't be a real big deal, I'm just wondering why they list some quantities of the SAME disks as "blank" silver tops, as well as "silver" tops.

[LanEvo7]

LanEvo: Are you able to burn the gold topped optodisks @ 2X? If so, with which burner? I used to have a Sony dual format, and it tried to burn them @ 2X, and would fail like 80% through the burn. They would burn successfully @ 1X. I switched back to my old trusty Pioneer A04, and I want to find a cheapoid media to complement the Samsung BeAlls I regularly use.

Is anyone using the Accu/DupEZ Sony disks burning them on a Pioneer drive? If so, can you successfully burn @ 2X?

Thanks for reminding me. I forgot to say that I am using a Pioneer A05 with the hacked "burn all 2x" firmware. I burn everything at 2x speed and they burn all the way until the edge. This worked with the DupEZ Silvers (LD), DupEZ SONY(these are naturally 2x), blue optodiscs, gold optodiscs, silver topped Ritek G03, and Princo. I bought a sample pack from rima and it came with the 2 DupEZ Silver tops(LD), 2 optodisc blue, 2 G03, 2 Princos, 1 Princo RW and 1 Optodisc RW. I've used 10 or more of the following, DupEZ Silver(LD), Dup EZ(SONY), and Optodisc Gold. All of these burned at 2x all the way until the end without any major issues. The rest of the discs in the sample pack, I've had 100% success rate burning at 2x except for the RW and the Princo -R. One Princo -R failed during burning and I haven't tried the RWs yet.

[VinnySem]

LanEvo: Are you able to burn the gold topped optodisks @ 2X? If so, with which burner? I used to have a Sony dual format, and it tried to burn them @ 2X, and would fail like 80% through the burn. They would burn successfully @ 1X. I switched back to my old trusty Pioneer A04, and I want to find a cheapoid media to complement the Samsung BeAlls I regularly use.

Is anyone using the Accu/DupEZ Sony disks burning them on a Pioneer drive? If so, can you successfully burn @ 2X?

Thanks for reminding me. I forgot to say that I am using a Pioneer A05 with the hacked "burn all 2x" firmware. I burn everything at 2x speed and they burn all the way until the edge. This worked with the DupEZ Silvers (LD), DupEZ SONY(these are naturally 2x), blue optodiscs, gold optodiscs, silver topped Ritek G03, and Princo. I bought a sample pack from rima and it came with the 2 DupEZ Silver tops(LD), 2 optodisc blue, 2 G03, 2 Princos, 1 Princo RW and 1 Optodisc RW. I've used 10 or more of the following, DupEZ Silver(LD), Dup EZ(SONY), and Optodisc Gold. All of these burned at 2x all the way until the end without any major issues. The rest of the discs in the sample pack, I've had 100% success rate burning at 2x except for the RW and the Princo -R. One Princo -R failed during burning and I haven't tried the RWs yet.

\

Ahh so there is a FW hack for the A05 to burn all @ 2X. I am thinking about upgrading from my A04 to the A05 in anticipation of 4X media becoming more widely available from quality brands. As I read this, I see CDR/DVDR Media nbow carries 1/2/4X BeAll media. But dayum they expensive.

Also interesting that you were able to burn Optodisk Golds at 2X without a problem. I had bought a spindle of these from Rima when I had my Sony DRU 500, and the 1st 4 off the top tried to burn @ 2X and failed like 85% of the way. I tried one at 1X and burned OK. I sent them back because I want to burn @ 2X at a minimum.

[Raedon]

I moved to DupEZ's after Riteks went over $100 and have gone threw over 250 Inkjet SONY's at 2x and had no fails.

The only problem with DupEZ DVD-R media is that my Playstation 2 has problems with them. I got a 25 of Riteks for PS2 games (only burn maybe 1 game a month or so.) and DupEZ is nothing but movies. Never had a problem with DVD movies burned at 2x..

[Jevon]

I'm a newbie here and this may seem like a stupid question but how can you tell the difference between sony and LD? Is it the #'s on the disk or do you have to run a program to read them?

[Artistimus]

anyone know where to buy these dupez/accu dvd-r at cheap as possible? i need about 200.

[disturbed1]

I'm a newbie here and this may seem like a stupid question but how can you tell the difference between sony and LD? Is it the #'s on the disk or do you have to run a program to read them?

Use advinfo, or dvdinfo look here https://www.videohelp.com/dvdmediaform.php?dvdinfo=1#dvdinfo for instructions.

anyone know where to buy these dupez/accu dvd-r at cheap as possible? i need about 200.

Prices per 100

Rima = $85 + ~$6 s/h http://www.rima.com/Merchant2/merchant.mv?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=R&Product_Code=1619-1...tegory_Code=GU

Meritline = $96 + ~$10 s/h http://www.meritline.com/ac47dvsilbla1.html