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DVD Speed - do I care about the higher numbers?


jeffw_00

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I did a web search of DVD FAQs, but nothing mentioned this. I'm looking at DVD burners, and seeing how some burn some formats at 4X, some at 8X, some at 16X, etc. But I think some told me that after like 4x, it didn't matter because other things in a normal system slowed it down, so that 8x and 16x were like ATA-133 or 70x CD.any truth to this?/thanks/j

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I have an 8X burner, and the software reports that the burn is progressing at 8X with 8X media. I cannot verify 16X though. ;)Hope this helps.Adam

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The difference in 4x and 8x DVD burn times is quite noticeable. Burning to DVD+R at 4x takes about 20 minutes for a full disk; at 8x it only take 11 minutes. If I had 16x media I'm sure it would be less than 6 minutes. At 2.4x you will be lucky to finish in under 45 minutes.

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ok - then a newer drive with 8x speeds for some of the formats (like DVD-R, DVD-DL+R) is worth the extra cost.and if i buy one today, I'll be bummed in 6 months when all the 8x drives are upgraded to 16x (sigh)so - do ALL the formats matter? if something has good +R, +RW numbers do I need something that also does -R -RW just as fast?my 2 applications are video dvds and data backups thanks/j

Edited by jeffw_00
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-R and -RW formats haven't increased as fast as +R and +RW. I use +RW/+R for backups and -RW/-R for video.

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Capacity does, slightly, though I do not remember which one was slightly smaller. Other than that..... the -R and -RW offer slightly better compatibility with legacy players and drives.

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This is a good article that explains the differences between + and -. I only stated I used -R for video because traditionally that's what the majority of set-top boxes were capable of playing up until very recently. Really, I'd use DVD+R and +RW exclusively.

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I've been using +R and +RW for over a year for daily backups at 4x. It usually takes about 12 min for 2.5GB. I good through email when backing up. No writing errors ever.

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