Is it safe to buy dvd burner

[tater1969]

Bottom line what is the format of the future,do i buy now?

[menace]

format of the future hmmm.... holographic displays with virtual reality interface that lets you experience the movie first hand hmmm.. that would make those love scenes with angelina jolie REALLY good!!!

Actually just read the dvd writers section as well as the off topic section --there was some discussion on the future media wars--consensus was that dvd media is hear for at least as long as CD media--so go for it--I'm going to as soon as i can reasonably afford it!

[DiViNeLeFT]

personally i am going to wait... i dont think either format is going to become the "standard"... compare recordable dvd media to modem technology in this case... remember when USR came out with x2 and other brands like conexant came out with kflex... after everyone rushed out to get their new technology they came with a brand new standard of v.90... im not going to spend $300+ on a dvd drive for it to be obsolete in a year. im gunna wait for the industry to develop a standard of pick one of the current ones.

[SLK001]

Well, gee, folks, sitting on the sideline will do NOTHING to speed up the pick of a "standard". It will be the universal acceptance of a single format that will drive the vendors to a "standard". By your logic, CD's are now obsolete - but a glance at their popularity proves otherwise. Until the technology makes a major leap, DVD's will remain the best choice for movie distribution.

As for the recorders, it will be the PRICE of the drives AND the media (plus, of course, the compatibility issue) that will win this battle. If you remember VHS vs Beta, clearly Beta was the TECHNICALLY SUPERIOR product. However, the VHS boys were the first with LOW COST recorders, which swept the market. Sony (inventor of Beta) now makes VHS machines. With DVD-R prices hovering around the sub-$2 range and DVD-RW around $3-4 range, this battle was won before it even started (and by the DVD-R and -RW crowd). With DVD+RW's around $12ea and DVD+R just making their debuts, this is a case of "too little, too late" (or, in this case "too much, too late!).

As for compatibility, suffice it to say that the DVD-R is BY FAR the more compatible format.

This is "bleeding edge" technology. If this frightens you, then you should either pull the covers up over your heads, or hide under the bed.

'Nuff said.

[Chemcat]

I think I'm still going to hold out a while longer, I don't have a burning need for a DVD writer yet. I read an article in a recent MaximumPC magazine saying that Toshiba is coming out soon with a blue laser burner, 30 gigs per disc and backward compatible to other formats. Not to sure about the price though, it'll prolly be pretty high to begin with.

[alkieman]

Toshiba's blue laser technology is being developed in partnership with Sony, well, actually Sony are doing most of the work but Toshiba and others are part of the forum investigating the technology.

Sony previewed blue laser DVD at the recent CES show in Vegas and I believe were also at the CeBIT show in Germany recently too. It will be a few years yet before consumer blue laser DVD writers are available, remember consumer DVD writers are only just appearing in numbers but dvd video has been around for 3-4 years now.

If you want to wait for blue laser do so, but what's the betting on a new format being announced when blue laser recorders become affordable?

[nemethmik]

I agree that DVD-R is the only way to go today.
Do not buy a DVD+RW burner today.
Go for a Pioneer A03, A04 ($400 - $450) or Panasonic LF-D311 ($300).
The Panasonic also supports DVD-RAM, check out
Hitachi's DVD camcorders.

[SatStorm]

DVD-R(g) has win many battles till now against other formats. Also, it is compatible with the 90% of the DVD standalones out there (and almost all new ones).
So, it seems like dvd-r is the way to go. The question is for "when".
I have an answer for that: On May, pioneer and panasonic gonna present their new 4X DVD recorders, in the same price today costs the 2X pioneer one. On December, there are reports that pioneer gonna release a 8X DVD burner.
So, the way I see it, you buy in a couple of months of you buy on Xmass.
Now it is not the right time.

[Mirror_Image]

I remember, some years back, when I went big bank and bought a Pentium Pro 200, the fastest CPU available for the home PC...but not for long...it's been put out to pasture as a print server and a half-life dedicated server now, haha.

[nemethmik]

4x and 8x dvd recorders are great, but if you are a home movie maker
and want to author your own DVDs (optionally adding some ripped clips) the burning time is totally insignificant compared to the MPEG2 encoding if you cannot afford a $700 - $2000 MPEG encoder card.
TMPGenc converted a 1-hour high-quality DVD movie into MPEG2 in 11 hours on a 1GHz Pentium III. Then I burned the 4-Gig DVD-R in 52 minutes
on a 1x (1385KBps) write-speed Panasonic DVD-R/RAM burner.
My conclusion is that if you are a non-professional DVD author the best deal today is a Panasonic LF-D311 for $300 using it with very good quality still inexpensive ($5/disk) Apple DVD-R disks.
The DVD-R created by Pana can be played on (nearly) all DVD players.

[NightWing]

That is the problem but it was also the problem back when a fast system was a 166 and trying to do even small mpeg1 stuff. It will be solved and at a cheep price. But it will take some time.

I agree on DVD-R will be the winner. Mostly DVD+RW are backed I think by the computer companies and Sony. DVD-R/RW is backed by the DVD group which is the plus on their side. Also the 90% compatablity rate is also a major plus. The problem with DVD+RW is that they look like a Double Layer disk to a lot of players. Why they did not include R disk in the initial release will be the thing that hurst them. -drive you get the best of both worlds +drive were mostly designed for computer use not really video stuff.

If they drop the price of the Fstgen between 199 and 249.99 that would put the sword right through DVD+RW. Esp since the DVD+RW stumbled on the write once disk upgrade/have it and the vaperware of "it will be out soon" for the last few years. This would also crush the CD-R/RW drives. Cd-R/RW are at 40x to write but still stuck at 700mb size. The double size disk failed since DVD Writers actualy pop out at the same time they were annousing them. 4.7gb Std vs 1.2gb Limited std not much to figure on.

The real fun will be when you see STB DVD recorders around 399 or even 299.

[madrockr]

I am very happy with my Pioneer A-03. I have taken most of my movies that were on laser and put them to DVD-R. The quality is very good. The sound is also very good. I think that it is safe to buy a DVD burner and will probably buy another burner within the next couple of months. I use the DVC-II to capture the video and TEMPG to cut and splice. I also use DVDit PE which allows me to encode the sound into dolby digital 5.1. This also me to safe space for more video verses the PCM encoding. I have gotten my moneys worth with this equipment, so I say go for it and get the DVD-R burners the media is not expensive any more.

[Mirror_Image]

Buy the top of the line today, and by next month it'll be "that old stuff". It's always the same, there really isn't any "perfect time" to buy.

[SHS]

You folks need read more about this
Comparison DVD+R/RW vs DVD-R/RW
Oh and DVD-R is not 90% compatible with all of Home DVD Player and PC DVD drive more like 70% compatible.
If all gose well I belive DVD+R should be more compatible a cross old and new Home DVD player.
Feature are key is point here which DVD-R/RW lack alot of not count what a burning time diff be beteew the two.

[RAAGAAman]

Look were you're getting your info, the DVD+RW Hype site. The people who put the cart before the horse and delivered a rewritable format before they delivered a write once format. Did you even look at this sites DVD Player compatibilty list? Most have DVD-R listed as supported.

RG

[Greg12]

u believe that.


a neutral source i would believe

[DiViNeLeFT]

for everyone trying to decide which format with win the battle... you are forgetting that with computer technology its not that black and white... like i said before with the modem analogy... x2 or kflex... which one won the battle?? neither... so for all anyone knows neither of the two formats will "win the battle". i gotta admit dvd-r and dvd-rw look to be winning compared to the + formats... but does that necessarily mean either will become the standard format... no.

[Sefy]

Talking about future formats, how about FMD ? 140gb, will be backward compatible so you can play CD/DVD on it (but not FMD on CD/DVD of course) and it's coming out already as we speak, i've already seen an FMD HDTV system!

[SHS]

RAAGAAman all web site are hype site so your point is ponit less and as DiViNeLeFT said which I have to agree with (but does that necessarily mean either will become the standard format) it sound alot like the battle of DircetX vs OpenGL.
Beside that not where I got all my info I look at lot of review, newsgroup web forum, BBS.

[RAAGAAman]

SHS
I agree I do not see a clear winner in the Format war. The DVD forum and the +RW alliance have screwed the consumer on these formats. But I have done my own comparisons. As far Compatibilty, DVD-R has about 90% and DVD+R I predict will have 93%. This was done by actually trying DVD-R on multiple DVD Players. I agree older players could have a problem with DVD-R but the majority of DVD players that have been sold in the last two years have no problem with DVD-R.
We can only hope that all of this will mean drives will get cheaper quicker since they are trying to get us suckers to buy one.

RG

[Bullworth]

Do you guy remember the price of the first CDR burner that came out? It was definitely out of reach of most people and look at them now. I personally want a DVD burner but I know it's more of a whim than an actual need or advantage. I think it's still best to wait at least for prices to come down. Like someone posted before there's no perfect time to buy but there are better ones.

[moonmoon]

I remember the old CDR days. My friend, getting a high school graduation present of $1200 from his dad, decided he would be the coolest if he got a CDR burner. We all thought it was the coolest thing. How could you not want one! It has a 1x HP Burner. However, over the next two years it seemed like burners were affordable for all. The $400-$500 range. Thats when I jumped in.

The DVD arena is a bit different because of a format war with new hardware, but I really feel that the prices make it a small risk. I am going to get a DVD-R drive within a few weeks. I consider it a safe investment. However, I do know that it is possible that it may become the "betamax" format of DVD, but I have placed my bet and am willing to live with it.

[SatStorm]

@ Sefy: I think FMD and Blue Ray Disc gonna be the Format battle of the future. FMD is better, but companies don't look like they want to support it...
Personally, I prefer FMD, it is a very good idea, but I believe its gonna turn out like a beta-like format... Only for pro use.
From the other hand, if it finds support, it might smash the market for good!

But for now, DVD-R is the way to go. I vote for it!

[alkieman]

Go with what the reviewers tell you. Tests in all the major magazines have shown DVD-R to be compatible with 80-90% of stand alone DVD players that have been tried, DVD-RW drops to around 60-70% and DVD+RW is similar to DVD-RW. No one knows how compatible DVD+R will be because it does not exist yet for us poor consumers to buy.

It does get more confusing though, some players that do not play DVD-R will play DVD-RW.

At the moment the choice is simple, if you want the most compatible DVD Video format and don't mind the burn speeds being lower buy a DVD-R/RW burner.

I also think HP, Philips and the other DVD+RW supporters have shot themselves in the foot by announcing that current DVD+RW burners will not be upgradeable to support DVD+R. This is an appaling way to treat customers seeing as they have spent the last year telling us they would be upgradeable.

Blue laser is rapidly gaining support and will undoubtedly be the recordable format of the future even though FMD is the superior format but consumer level blue laser recorders are several years away. You can't go through life thinking "I'll wait on the next format" because there will always be another waiting in the wings. IBM and others are already working on holographic storage systems and even storage formats that work at the atomic level. Again, they are probably 10-15 years away from being perfected but eventually they'll arrive.

Take what the people at DVDPLUSRW.ORG tell you with a pinch of salt. They have been going around for the last year spreading mistruths and downright lies about the other formats. They all have their merits but for simply compatibility and price you can't beat DVD-R/RW. In the UK you can already buy DVD-R blanks for around 1.50 and DVD-RW for 2.09 so DVD+R will probably always be more expensive.

[krypdo]

To answer the "do I buy now" question, I bought a sample DVD-R from this site http://www.digital-encoding.com/demo_discs.htm
and tested it on my DVD drives and DVD players.

This way for about $10 you can test out DVD-R compatibility with your current equipments.

[Sefy]

SatStorm, i'm with you all the way, FMD-ROM rocks, and the company is making alot of progress in distributing it and to try and give it big support and I do believe it has a future.

As for DVD-R it is defenetly the winner at the moment, for one, you can actually buy a DVD-R/DVD-RW drive and media and they are more compatible with both DVD-ROM drives and old DVD Players then the current DVD+RW drives.

[SHS]

alkieman it does to exist but not all consumers can buy it rigth now like all new product that come out it take time to get in the market place

[alkieman]

The good thing about all of this is that prices have probably fallen a bit quicker than they would have. I mean the new Pioneer A04 for 299 UKP?. OK, it's the OEM version but still.

So, the year long vapour trail at last becomes solid and DVD+R is now available. That still doesn't help the poor thousands who swallowed Philips/HP and Ricoh's lies about current models being upgradeable. This is a horrendous way to treat customers although of course, it's not unusual.

There's probably room for both formats for a while at least but you cannot argue with prices, DVD-R blanks are incredibly cheap retailing for around 1.50 UKP for bulk blanks. DVD-RW is now around 2UKP for branded blanks from Princo and a couple of others, and even cheap for unbranded bulks.

Unfortunately Philips may have brought DVD+R to the market place too late, but then they have a habit of backing the failed but technically excellent formats. Remember DCC, Laservision (which they left to Pioneer to relaunch to some moderate success), V2000 ?.

DVD+R/RW prices will inevitably fall but prices will probably always be more than DVD-R/RW unless Philips persuades companies to flood the market.

DVD-R/RW is also part of the official DVD specifications, although of course companies do not HAVE to include compatibility in their players. But they have done so for the past 2 years and every player I tried on a visit to Dixons (Thanks Mike) and Comet played the discs flawlessly, even the three Philips machines.

DVD+R is now available so it will be interesting to see if the compatibility claims live up to the hype. But again, remember that DVD+RW did NOT live up to the hype and it's compatibility has proved to be (according to What Video, What DVD, Home Entertainment and other mags) a less than DVD-RW.

I just wish Sony would hurry up and launch their DVD-R/RW DVD+R/RW recorder due at the end of the year.

[Sefy]

Guys, i've added to the CD Writers (Comparison List) all the latest drives, including DVD Writers, so if you know of any other companies that their drives are being sold and it's not on the list, let me know so i can update it.