DVD-R 2x, 4x Differences?

[steve1173]

Am using a Panasonic DMR-E50 recorder. I use general discs, the TDK says it is 2x & the Memorex does not state. I keep reading here about 4x, etc. What is the differences between the 2x & 4x, etc.

[hotwings]

If your burner has 4x burning capabilities then it would burn a 4x disc twice as fast as a 2x disc. Generally, burning a full 1x disc takes about an hour, a 2x disc is half an hour and 4x is about 15 minutes. If the Memorex says nothing about the speed, then it is probably 1x, but most of these can burn at 2x just fine anyway. Discs rated at 2x are kind of an oddity because it is generally believed that they are the same as 1x discs, except they are labelled so that you know that they can burn at 2x (correct me if I'm wrong). You do however, need a 4x disc to burn at 4x. Something to do with the intensity of the burn (or so someone else said on this site). hope this helps.

[steve1173]

With my stand alone Panasonic recorder it records shows at 60, 120, 240 & 360 minutes off the satellite. Does this effect which disc 1x, 2x or 4x or is it for recording the discs in less time. The discs say on the box for general recording.

[Faustus]

In order to record at 4x you need both a 4x disc and a recorder able to record at 4x. THEN it takes less time to record.

[holistic]

Single speed DVD-ROM drives have a data transfer rate of approximately 11 Mb/s, which is equivalent to a 9x CD-ROM drive. A 4x drive can theoretically transfer data at 44 Mb/s --- in theory of course

For computer DVD burners the above numbers come into affect because the MPEG2 data is already available on the harddrive.

In your case however, since you have a stand alone recorder ,it will ONLY record as fast as the source. example - video stream from satellite is real time therefore recording is real time. -- 1 : 1 ratio.

In the case of 60, 120, 240 & 360 - these numbers reflect bitrates. The longer the record time the lower the bitrate.

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[Dubber]

Single speed DVD-ROM drives have a data transfer rate of approximately 11 Mb/s, which is equivalent to a 9x CD-ROM drive. A 4x drive can theoretically transfer data at 44 Mb/s --- in theory of course

Correct me if I'm wrong, I thought 'single speed' was 1.38 Mbps..

[holistic]

You are proberly confused with the following :

(Mb) Megabit:
1 million bits.
(MB) Megabyte:
1 million bytes.

11 Mb (bits) divided by 8 (bits in a byte) = ~1.38 MB (megabytes)

http://www.abbreviationstation.com/computer-internet/MB.html

I hope this clears it up for you.
Manufacturers , or I should say their marketing people like to confuse the public with numbers. Since 'megabits' gives a higher number than 'megabytes' ,and they are the same letters, they often use them to confuse and distract.

You are correct BUT so am I .. :P

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[overloaded_ide]

The time listed on a DVD box for the disks means nothing really if your using them on a computer, and probably not much on a stand alone recorder either! Since they are all the same size (amount of data), they all hold the same info

The X is the speed the disk can be recorded at and like another said, with a standalone recorder direct from tv(or vcr) you can only record at the speed you can watch, 1/1.
I would geuss you should be able to use 1x disks as fast as you can use 2x disks. Being you are limited to TIME to watch, not size. A 1x disk burns for me in about an Hour for a full disk. So a 1hr show will fill a disk in 1 hour. BUT, a 2hr show will take 2hrs to fill the same disk (same amount of data, but lower bit rates per second). I dought anyone would really ever need to fill a DVD disk for just a 30 minute show with a stand alone, and probaly not even a setting to do it, but that's the only time I could think of you might need a 2x disk really for live recording.

Now if your standalone will record to memory or hardrive first then transfer that DATA to the DVD disk, then a faster disk might be usefull if the recorder supports that speed. Like if you set a timer to record a show at 2am to a hard drive first, then after previewing it you want to burn the disk. Since it is already captured and stored, then it could be burned faster than 1x, but still only at the fastest speed the recorder supports of course. So if you have a 1X recorder, then it still only burns 1X anyway!

It is dependant upon your recorder settings how long a movie you can record on the disks, not the disks! If all recorders use the same settings, then they all record the same amount of data/time. If not then they don't, either way the time on the package for disks means nothing, you need to look at the times for your recorder!
What ever the recorder says is what all disks will do,
SP=1hr EP=2hr Lp=4hr, or whatever the actual time may be? I don't have one , so just geussing on the times. But it's the same on all disks, if you record the full disk of course. The longer the time, the lower the quality after a certain point.

Anyone remember when VCRs were first getting popular? SP (standard play) was the same on all of them. LP (long play) and EP (extended play) was not the same on all of them. What that meant was if you recorded a tape in SP all players played it correctly, but in EP or LP you took your chances! Your VCR would play it fine, but take an EP or LP recorded tape to a friends house and it might not play on their player! Or if you bought a new VCR you might not be able to play your own tapes either. I had a friend that lost about 100 ep and lp tapes that way when his player died. The new ones did not record/play at the same tape speed for EP/LP as his old one did and they were garbled.
That was VHS, don't know if the Beta's had the same problems or not with EP/LP?