Complete DVD Novice: Needs Advice!

FrozenNail 2008-11-04 05:31:44 UTC #1

Hi all,

Need some help please. About to change hard drives and thought I'd do some backing up of my pictures and documents. However, I've only ever done this to CD before so need some help with DVDs..

Obvious reason i want to back up to DVD is space: I have lots of family photo's and documents I want to keep safe before changing hard drives.

But.. If I select a picture / folder / file in XP and try to copy this to my DVD (+RW) it won't work??

What's the reason for this - burning to CD works fine? Is there more software I need - if so what? I don't need anything that bypasses security etc etc.. Just that enables me to backup photos/videos and files? Is this possible or do I need to stick to CD?

I have read the forums to try and find help but it seems most help is aimed at burning/copying movies etc.. Not the basics!

Running Windows XP and using an NEC ND3500 DVD Burner thingy

beef_barley 2008-11-04 05:44:01 UTC #2

Give ImgBurn a try.

http://www.imgburn.com/

maineman 2008-11-04 05:46:52 UTC #3

Hi FrozenNail and welcome,

XP does not have built-in dvd burning capability…only cd burning as you’ve discovered.
You’ll need a 3rd party dvd burning software. You probably already have something like nero…? bundled with your burner.
Nero or the like should do quite nicely for photos, documents, etc…

Edit:…Hi beef, didn’t see you there

FrozenNail 2008-11-04 05:54:21 UTC #4

Thanks for the advice… if I did have a Nero disk I’ve long since lost it!

I’ve had a look and they have a 15 day trial so I’ll give that a go.

Image burn… looks free! will that copy/backup files to DVD or is that more of an image and movie burner?

No doubt I’ll be back with some questions!

coolcolors 2008-11-04 10:02:12 UTC #5

[QUOTE=maineman;2151549]Hi FrozenNail and welcome,

Edit:…Hi beef, didn’t see you there[/QUOTE]

I thought it did have dvd burning for just the copy and paste feature of xp? Might have to go back home and test this function out again.

coolcolors 2008-11-04 10:05:17 UTC #6

[QUOTE=FrozenNail;2151553]Thanks for the advice… if I did have a Nero disk I’ve long since lost it!

I’ve had a look and they have a 15 day trial so I’ll give that a go.

Image burn… looks free! will that copy/backup files to DVD or is that more of an image and movie burner?

No doubt I’ll be back with some questions![/QUOTE]

Here are some features for imgburn…

http://www.imgburn.com/

*  Read - Read a disc to an image file
* Build - Create an image file from files on your computer or network - or you can write the files directly to a disc
* Write - Write an image file to a disc
* Verify - Check a disc is 100% readable. Optionally, you can also have ImgBurn compare it against a given image file to ensure the actual data is correct
* Discovery - Put your drive / media to the test! Used in combination with DVDInfoPro, you can check the quality of the burns your drive is producing

But I haven’t fully used imgburn so I can only post what they said about their software from their site. And it’s free as well.

beef_barley 2008-11-04 15:12:59 UTC #7

I think this says a lot.