can some explain the practical use of a DVD-RW drive please

[PrineFan]

i see that DVD-RW's are getting to be in vogue on computers....

can someone explain the practical use of these? i can understand you can record tv shows like a vcr-- but wouldn't that be hooked up to the tv set, and not the computer??

i am sure there are uses for dvd-rw's in computers--- just need them explained to me briefly. if anyone can help-- thanks

 

[downhiller80]

Well naturally the main use is for pirating DVDs, but I'd buy one to use for frequent reliable backup. I wouldn't buy one for the first reason because media is still way too expensive over here in the UK, but I'd get one for backup with just a disk or two if the drives were under £150.

- seb

 

[AndyHui]

It's great for Ghosting.

If I want to back up my entire OS partition, including the data on it, I only need one DVD-RW disk, rather than several CDs. I'm not particularly trusting of spanning a backup across several discs. What happens when one of them goes bad or you lose one? If nothing else, you don't have to swap discs.

 

[Superwormy]

Backing up data. Sometimes you have too much data then will fit on a CD.

Or making extra copies of data that you need to have access to quickly sometimes, cause like if you were to use a Tape drive, then the only thing you can usually do is restore EVERYTHIGN, and you can't usually pull individual files off the Tape quickly, DVD-RW allows you to do that.

 

[LilScoooters]

Those 8456 porno photos you now have can be burned on the dvd...freeing up 10 gig of Hard Drive Space!!!

 

[ViRGE]

<< Well naturally the main use is for pirating DVDs, but I'd buy one to use for frequent reliable backup. I wouldn't buy one for the first reason because media is still way too expensive over here in the UK, but I'd get one for backup with just a disk or two if the drives were under £150.

- seb >>



Pirating isn't quite possible yet with these things. If I recall, all the existing burners are still single-layer burners, while many DVDs are dual-layer. Because of that, the burner, in the best case senario, wouldn't be able to copy the movie past the point where it switches layers.