[Wahiawa786]

The DVD+R DL subject was the 5/5/2007 tribute to Don Ho, which was stated to last 5 hours, so I set the Sony RDR-VX530 to run for 6 hours at "ESP" speed. Checking the disk later, I noticed that at the 4 hour mark, there was a pronounced playback delay as layer 2 was accessed.

The players: 3GHz P4 tower, Windows XP Home, 512MB RAM, 2/120GB HDD, Sony DRU-120C DVD/CD Rewritable drive, Samsung DVD-ROM/CD RW drive. 1.25GHz Mac AlBook, Mac OS X 10.4.9, 512MB RAM, 80GB HDD + LaCie d2 external DVD/CD burner.

The situation: Put the DVD+R DL in the Samsung DVD-ROM drive as the source for the Sony DVD burner. (The disk works just fine with an ordinary Sony DVP-NS325 player.) Using EMC 9 to copy "disk to disk," things went fine until I got to the 70-80% mark, then I got a "read error" message and ended up with an incomplete but playable 4 hour DVD. At $2+ per disk, this was not good news, so I copied the DL's disk contents to an image file. Next, I used the internal Sony DVD burner to record from the image file. Something was a bit odd, there was no progress display, and the disk was ejected about 22 minutes later. A popup window suggested that the disk be finalized to play in ordinary DVD players. The DVP-NS325 player wouldn't play it, but the RDR unit saw it , played it, and the Timer option was available. (There's recording space available? Why did EMC insist that I insert a blank DVD disk when I tried to finalize the disk?

The odd part: I bought Roxio Toast 8 and installed it on the Mac AlBook. (This 2003 vintage Mac's SuperDrive won't see/play DVD DL disks, while the LaCie d2 drive will.) I created an image file on the AlBook's HDD, and had to use Tools to "recover lost/damaged files" on the "won't play on the DVD player" disk. Taking a deep breath, I copied the image file onto a fresh DVD+R DL disk, which took the LaCie d2 drive 42 minutes. The result? It plays on the DVP-NS325 player with no problems! It's enough to make one toss the Windows XP Home unit into the landfill, though the next thing is to see if the LaCie d2 works with the 3GHz P4 tower, too. Any comments on this very interesting tale of two systems?

[gi7omy]

Did you try using Disc Copier to record the iso image file?

Usually that will shrink to fit, but, even with dual layer, 5 hours is stretching things (a dual layer normally holds about 1 hour 50 at best quality, with quality dropping off as the compression increases)

[Wahiawa786]

Did you try using Disc Copier to record the iso image file?

Usually that will shrink to fit, but, even with dual layer, 5 hours is stretching things (a dual layer normally holds about 1 hour 50 at best quality, with quality dropping off as the compression increases)

Yes, I did that, and saw nothing happening in the status boxes. (I ended an earlier session, wondering if anything was going on after 15 minutes.) I left the next burn and returned 30 minutes later to find the disk ejected and the "finalize this disk for best results" message. I wasn't trying for best quality, since the source was network TV, hoping for "just above VHS quality."

[Wahiawa786]

The DVD+R DL subject was the 5/5/2007 tribute to Don Ho, which was stated to last 5 hours, so I set the Sony RDR-VX530 to run for 6 hours at "ESP" speed. Checking the disk later, I noticed that at the 4 hour mark, there was a pronounced playback delay as layer 2 was accessed.

The players: 3GHz P4 tower, Windows XP Home, 512MB RAM, 2/120GB HDD, Sony DRU-120C DVD/CD Rewritable drive, Samsung DVD-ROM/CD RW drive. 1.25GHz Mac AlBook, Mac OS X 10.4.9, 512MB RAM, 80GB HDD + LaCie d2 external DVD/CD burner.

The situation: Put the DVD+R DL in the Samsung DVD-ROM drive as the source for the Sony DVD burner. (The disk works just fine with an ordinary Sony DVP-NS325 player.) Using EMC 9 to copy "disk to disk," things went fine until I got to the 70-80% mark, then I got a "read error" message and ended up with an incomplete but playable 4 hour DVD. At $2+ per disk, this was not good news, so I copied the DL's disk contents to an image file. Next, I used the internal Sony DVD burner to record from the image file. Something was a bit odd, there was no progress display, and the disk was ejected about 22 minutes later. A popup window suggested that the disk be finalized to play in ordinary DVD players. The DVP-NS325 player wouldn't play it, but the RDR unit saw it , played it, and the Timer option was available. (There's recording space available? Why did EMC insist that I insert a blank DVD disk when I tried to finalize the disk?

The odd part: I bought Roxio Toast 8 and installed it on the Mac AlBook. (This 2003 vintage Mac's SuperDrive won't see/play DVD DL disks, while the LaCie d2 drive will.) I created an image file on the AlBook's HDD, and had to use Tools to "recover lost/damaged files" on the "won't play on the DVD player" disk. Taking a deep breath, I copied the image file onto a fresh DVD+R DL disk, which took the LaCie d2 drive 42 minutes. The result? It plays on the DVP-NS325 player with no problems! It's enough to make one toss the Windows XP Home unit into the landfill, though the next thing is to see if the LaCie d2 works with the 3GHz P4 tower, too. Any comments on this very interesting tale of two systems?

A session using the LaCie d2 external DVD/CD burner was successful under Nero 7, so it was time to see if EMC9 could do the same. This time, I checked every single "Options" box for other-than-default settings that had produced coasters. Using the Sony internal DVD/CD burning drive as source and the LaCie d2 as destination, I selected "cache to HDD for better results" and "verify disk" options. Time ticked past the 1 hour mark for all options to be played out, but this time the DVD+R DL works just fine on the Sony DVP-NS325 player. The one big change was using the "verified under Toast 8.x" DVD as the source; time to replace this disk's contents on the HDD to see if I can use the 3GHz P4's internal DVD burner drive.