Originally posted by: RossMAN
Do I need DVD-R or DVD+R?
Which is best for burning data off a hard drive and which is better for copying DVD movies?
DVD burning can be incredibly complicated. I've been reading as much as I can and am still a long ways from feeling like I understand it completely. Here's what I have learned so far.
1. Some players seem to like -R and some +R
2. Some burners seem to like -R and some +R
It isn't necessarily a 'this is good for movies and that is good for data' equation.
This guide
here is helpful for tracking player idiosyncrasies.
And this is a great
guide for burners
Of much greater importance than +/-R is the quality of the media. Brand can be a decent indicator of quality, although, over time, because of the ever changing nature of the tech industry, respected brands can cut corners and lose favor (look at Antec, for example). At the moment, Verbatim seems to be pretty highly respected. For long term back up of data I care about or movies I cherish, I use verbatim. If it's a TV show I might watch once or twice or a short term, incremental backup, I use cheap, questionable quality discs like the Playos discussed in this thread. Not that cheap is always bad. My Playos, as I mentioned earlier, seem to be treating me right. I'm not sure how well they're situated for long term storage, though.
Copying movies can have it's own challenges. A movie, depending on the size/extras/subtitles, can be around 4 to 9 gb. A DVD+/-R is 4.7 gb. In order to fit it, you usually have to compress it. Compression usually results in some loss of quality. There are dual layer discs that fit twice as much information (and dual layer drives), but the discs are expensive, the write time is, at this time, for most burners, slow, and seems to be somewhat unreliable. At least that's my take on it. I'm waiting to get into DL burning. The future should bring more reliable/cheaper/faster improvements in this area. I might get into it sooner rather than later but it hinges learning more about the process and, most importantly, finding a phenomenal deal on DL media. I have no doubt that in the learning process, I'm going to go through a lot of discs. At the prices they are now, that could get costly- too costly for me.
Copying movies can also get into copyright/legal issues, making it somewhat difficult to find ripping software and instructions to use it.
Anyway, this is probably way too much information. What I'm really trying to say is that if you want to get into making backup copies of your DVD movie collection, the learning curve is pretty steep.
Here are some of the top sites on this subject:
http://www.cdfreaks.com/
http://www.videohelp.com/
http://www.afterdawn.com/
The forum areas are all especially helpful.
