DVD Burner = $89.99 @ CompUSA

Dyre Straits · Nov 26, 2003, 10:39 PM

Too late for everyone, but, I took the plunge this evening and bought my first DVD burner.

It's a HiVal Dual Format burner that is listed regularly for $129.99. This evening only, from 6 p.m. to midnight, CompUSA was having a special sale. The drive had an instant rebate of $20.00 plus a mail-in rebate of another $20.00. Final cost, upon receipt of the mail-in rebate will be $89.99.

That was just too good to pass up.

I have it installed and burning my second data DVD as I'm writing this now.

I did find that it took quite a while for my other computer to open and read from the newly created data DVD. But, that DVD ROM drive did finally allow me to explore the contents. (I think it was trying to 'autorun' the contents and taking a long time.)

Anyway, I'll be looking for dependable DVD disks to work with. I was able to also get 15 blank DVDs along with 40 slim cases for a total of $9.99. So, my experimenting won't be too costly.

mothership · Nov 27, 2003, 11:49 AM

cool, hope u enjoy your new toy

tek · Nov 27, 2003, 12:05 PM

Sweet have fun man!!! I might want a DVD-Burner pretty soon, 4gigs of space = w00t

Nov 27, 2003, 01:58 PM

man.. i wish i had one for that cheap. and tek... it's 4.7 gigs...

~~DriveEuro~~ · Nov 27, 2003, 03:33 PM

http://store.yahoo.com/hoct12/midwbldv.html

$90 shipped

Dyre Straits · Nov 27, 2003, 04:04 PM

I am enjoying the new drive. I found out it's made by Accesstek, Inc. and they had already posted a firmware update. The FW update worked like a charm.

I've made one full DVD Movie that plays well on my computers, but, although it's recognized as a DVD in the Pioneer DV505 home player, I get a message, "Unable to Play".

The media I'm using is the experimental package that I got of 15 -R disks.

I'll be 'playing' around and also looking for tips as I learn about this new venture.

So far (knock on wood) there have been no 'coasters'.

Even though the DVD Movie disk won't play on the home player, it still does play on the computers.

EDIT: I put the Burn Protection through a really good stress test this evening. I selected over 4 GB of data to burn to the DVD and got the process going. All the files were selected from drive D on computer A.

Once the process started I then went to computer B and selected a game demo from within the group of files I had selected to burn to the DVD. I selected to Copy/Paste that demo to computer B. I got a few 'failed to copy' error messages, but never did select to Cancel the operation. I just kept pressing OK and then the Paste option to pick up where it left off.

BOTH the DVD creation and the file copy worked without a hitch.

I'd say that's a pretty good test.

The_Neon_Cowboy · Nov 27, 2003, 11:11 PM

best butys gotem for 109 and then a $20 mail in last time i looked 4X ver, duel meda type + and -

Dyre Straits · Nov 28, 2003, 01:30 AM

This drive I got is what they call an '8-in-1' drive. It handles DVD -/+R, DVD -/+ RW, CD-R, and CD-RW.

The 'out-of-pocket' cost was $109.99 plus tax with a mail-in $20 rebate.

I'm glad to see prices coming down. Now I'm on the lookout for some good quality DVD blanks at a good price.

jaysavesthedayy · Nov 30, 2003, 05:44 AM

crazy how price drops... tremendously.

Judas · Nov 30, 2003, 12:17 PM

not only am i waiting for the price to drop...but for dual layered dvds..... 8.8gb..... but even then... i'm iffy on getting one... as the newer 15-20gb HD-DVD's are saposed to pop out...soon....

Dyre Straits · Nov 30, 2003, 12:29 PM

I've been really pleased with the performance of this one so far. Not a coaster yet. (Knock on Wood.)

I can remember when I thought the 120 MB Floppy was going to be the 'next big thing'. I never did get one, and I'm glad of that. LOL

But, if I waited for every new technology that was coming down the pipe, I wouldn't have much now.

Bane the ECF · Dec 1, 2003, 10:43 PM

I want one of those Sony DRU510UL external multiformat DVD-RW drives. I wonder if they ever got their burn time problems fixed with their new firmware revision...'cause if they didn't I might just settle for a DRU510A internal one.

jaysavesthedayy · Dec 1, 2003, 11:56 PM

which one the dvd formats is the best compatible with regular DVD players??

Bane the ECF · Dec 2, 2003, 12:24 AM

DVD-R and DVD+R are both supposed to be both readable standards by DVD players. I guess generally speaking, DVD-R has less problems being readable on today's DVD players. The other problem seems to be that some burners burn incompatibly with some DVD players. I know that Tom's Hardware did a DVD burner review that included DVD player compatibility:

http://www.tomshardware.com/storage/...burner-40.html

Dyre Straits · Dec 2, 2003, 12:25 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by jaysavesthedayy
which one the dvd formats is the best compatible with regular DVD players??

From the sources I've read, the most dependable format for use in regular DVD players is the -R format. That's one reason that the +R burners have been much cheaper for a while.

EDIT: I'm enjoying using the full capacity of the DVD-R disks to back up my data. And, using Roxio Easy CD & DVD Creator 6, I'm able to backup files from other computers on the network, too. Using the Easy Creator Classic app, I'm presently backing up video captures that are spanning nearly 3 DVDs in one operation.