The oxymoronical question - Where can I get cheap DVD-Rs that are pretty decent?

Chad_Bronson 2011-06-13 13:44:13 UTC #1

Now I know this question has appeared a lot on the forum and to get a disc brand that is decent and cheap can seem like an oxymoron. But, there will be people who want to buy on the cheap and not be too knowledgable on the disc dyes, burning speeds and what not.

But forgive me, because I reckon in the DVD market where DVDs are now produced in less than 10p a disc, I reckon it is possible to bag a bargain and still get decent results.

Forget about disc brands, their worthless. What matters is the firmware used and the dye of the disc used. Needless to say you're probably going to all say "BUY VERBATIM, AVOID MEMOSUX" and the likes, but be reasonable chaps. People have got some good results from the apparent inferior brands

So what about, therefore listing some cheap brands that deliver some good results? For me, Memorex, Maxell, Sumvision brands like that have all delivered. Arita and the likes not so much.

Any ideas? Please post brand and the dye used if possible.

Arachne 2011-06-14 07:21:49 UTC #2

Are you looking for stuff sold in B&M shops, or online? If online is an option, UK stores only, or from elsewhere?

The thing with recommending certain discs, as I’m sure you know, is that with most brands you can’t just say, “buy this/avoid that…” 'cos you can’t guarantee the manufacturer from a brand - and it’s hard for the average Joe/Josephine to tell just from the packaging.

But having said that - the Philips discs I’ve bought have all been Philips’ own MIDs (C08 etc) or MBIL (MBIPG101 R04/R05 etc). So worth a shot if you can get them cheap enough.

HP, although they also use different manufacturers, have been CMC for all the ones I’ve had, so once again worth a shot if you can get them cheaply.

Of course, for DLs it’s still a no-brainer IMO. Verbies all the way.

Interesting that you consider Memorex/Maxell cheap as brands - I can only ever find them at the same price as Verbies.

EDIT: But still, the question has to be asked - if someone wants cheaper but good discs, or the best bang for their buck - is it really worth the gamble of possibly having to reburn, thus forking out twice as much as they would have for Verbies in the first place?

Chad_Bronson 2011-06-17 07:02:55 UTC #3

Sorry for the late reply Arachne; Not being on in a bit

I mean’t just in general as to where to buy the discs from, most of my discs are now bought at a local supplier in Rotherham called CopyCatz which does individual discs / bulk respectively. If not it’s usually B&M or Wilkinsons, which do my Maxell discs for roughly the same price anyway

And of course to tell people what to buy is not so easy. I hear a lot of people buy Verbatims based on their dye quality but their ubiquity is not so fantastic compared to, say, Memorex or Maxell, and tend to be much more expensive when bought from shops. (Internet not so much)

Maxell for me is probably the most common brand I’ve seen in shops, and whilst giving excellent performance under the RitekF1 dye - Heck, you know what I’m going to say next, so I won’t incase I’m starting to sound like a broken record. Maxell and lesser so Memorex are cheaper than Verbatims, and since I have yet to suffer a meltdown in my data the RitekF1 dye stays.

RitekG series as well as the RitekF series are all very stable, apart from the RitekG05 fiasco. And yes your right in saying if you buy cheap don’t expect it to last very long. For me, this reasoning doesn’t justify the pay cheap pay twice theory, when you pay (certainly for me) a Â£2 more, you can get discs that will last much, much longer.

I just bought a single Verbie DL disc for 90p from that CopyCatz, and used to paying 15p a disc for Maxell, the damn thing nearly killed me. I know Verbie discs are supposed to excellent, but God Above their bleeding from us! WHY are they always treble than cheaper competitors? (AOne DL come to mind, but their discs are shoddy) Surely to be so much extra is ripping us off?

Kerry56 2011-06-17 07:17:23 UTC #4

Verbatim DL uses a different manufacturing process that is more expensive than the Inverse stack system used in the cheapo DL disks.
2P vs Inverse Stack. That is a big part of the price difference.

The only Inverse Stack disks that have been any good have been the ones manufactured by FTI/Falcon.

Chad_Bronson 2011-06-17 07:21:38 UTC #5

I know that Verbatim are made more expensively (Therefore better quality production) But this can’t justify 90p a disc, surely? The alternative at my local supplier are the AOne disc, which are as we know are produced by UmeDisc under a Ricoh stamper and are, at best, absolute garbage. I’ve been here long enough to know what brands suck for me - AOne in their DVD department.

As are Bulkpaq… etc.

Arachne 2011-06-20 05:51:05 UTC #6

[QUOTE=Chad_Bronson;2592721]

Well put, as with all your posts

I’ve not been up long, so have just quoted a couple of points.

First one, I can definitely see your point as I had the same experience with Maxell RICOHJPN R03, as you’re having with the Maxell RITEK F1. But, I bet you’ve bought a few crappy MIDs along the way (as I did), before you hit on those nice Maxell RITEK F1s?

Which was really my point: how many people want to spend the time or the money in the hopes that one day they’ll chance upon a MID that their burner loves, and remains stable, when they can pay once (for Verbies)?

We could possibly debate this one til the end of time LOL

Kerry hit the nail on the head with the manufacturing difference.

That said. I’ve used RICOHJPN D01 067 DL discs (Infiniti 360 branded), and also Verbie Pearl White DLs (MII, MKM 003)…and they burn very well in one of my burners. The RICOHJPN D01’s seem to be doing well too, I burned those quite some time ago.

So some burners do better with the differently-manufactured DLs than others.

Chad_Bronson 2011-06-20 08:52:59 UTC #7

[QUOTE=Arachne;2593049]

So some burners do better with the differently-manufactured DLs than others.[/QUOTE]

Did I try several MID codes before I got the RitekF1? Interesting, though I can’t say yes for some reason. I’ve only really tried CMC MAG AM3 (Under 50pk Bulkpaq / 50pk RiDisc) combination, and this was on a Pioneer burner. The results sucked, probably as much as 75% either refused to verify or froze on my standalone.

So I savvied up. Because when I started this whole palaver, I simply assumed “Ahh it’s a DVD, they’re all the same!” They are not, as I have learned from my experience. So, switching from these nightmarish combinations, I switched from the to Maxell in the packs of 10 at Wilkinsons.

Reading the dye, I was assured RitekF1 is an excellent dye - Certainly much better than the mixed bag CMC, so I bought more and More Maxell until I’ve got to about 80 discs all Maxell (Another 10 or so are Bulkpaq / RiDisc combo).

I wasted money on buying crap discs before I found something I liked, under a brand I liked even more. However, here is the kicker. Now, I’m questing the longivity of the RitekF1 dye. Something is funky is happening with my discs - Most if not all of my data are failing to verify on a BenQ burner. (COUGH! )

However all of what are failing seem to be discs that have been recorded on my cheap-n-cheerful DVD recorder by Vistron - Which has a DVSKOREA burner inside, I believe? (DRL-200) I think the model number was. The Ritek discs burned on my computer under BenQ burner or even the Phillips which the BenQ replaced are verifying successfully, albeit a little slow, on IMGBurn.

Okay, so crap discs I thought. The even bigger kicker is these discs which refused to go to 20% on some discs all verify back on my mums Sony laptop drive! I don’t really want to copy all of my data to other discs But I would like to ask why does one disc work okay in one burner, and not the next?

Lesson learned in my year of serious burning? CMC MAG AM3 CAN be good media - But too erratic to be reliable. (Good batch / Bad batch) but that doesn’t mean to say they are bad. RitekF1 - Even better and can be got for around CMC prices. Fake TYG03? Don’t bother. The results are just garbage. RitekG05? Seemed to work okay and some of the discs my mothers friend burned are working okay. But after that fiasco, I wouldn’t recommend them.

(Cue Arachne to save the day. Maybe she can give, with her feline powers, give an explination to why it’s being so funky)

Arachne 2011-06-20 09:11:46 UTC #8

Regarding the BenQ and verifying/reading back - the 1650s that I gave to loving new homes, and the 1640 that I’m currently left with, are picky readers IMO (others’ experiences with their BenQs might be different, as is often the case ;)).

I’ve had a lot of discs that my BenQs tripped up on, whereas the same discs would read back fine on other, more tolerant drives.

If your mum’s Sony drive is a LiteOn in disguise, that may explain why it has no issues reading the discs. Answer is simple - while disc quality can vary, so can drives’ reading ablilities.

Out of sheer curiosiity, this - what model’s the Sony your mum has?

Sooooo. No magic wand answer to save the day, from me anyway. Just what I’ve experienced.

Chad_Bronson 2011-06-20 09:21:01 UTC #9

I would have thought a BenQ would have performed better than this, surely?

My mums is a SONY CRX850E (This is a laptop DVD/CDRW combo )

Arachne 2011-06-21 03:47:26 UTC #10

Again, I can only go by the BenQs I had/have, but I found whilst they are kick-ass in the burning department, reading-wise they’re not as tolerant as say, a Mediatek-chip drive (Samsung, most LiteOns…).

That doesn’t make them bad drives though, not in the slightest.

This is why many of us here have more than one drive fitted - one might cover for another’s “weakenesses”.

Regarding your mum’s Sony, I can’t be sure without further research (like a search of this forum :D), but I reckon that’s probably a MTK-chip LiteOn in Sony clothing. Hence why it’s a little more tolerant on the reading front.

Chad_Bronson 2011-06-21 10:56:56 UTC #11

Interesting, so rather than writing my discs of as failures (Because I can’t tell what are really failing and one that are hoaxes from the BenQ) is it best to just get a new writer, should I ever need one?

At best I only perform computer based recordings onto the disc - I.e. those produced by my computer burner - And rarely use to check up my DVD collection.

I would also like to add that my DVDs that are “failing” were produced on my Vistron DVD recorder, which has a DVSKOREA DRL-200 burner inside. What the heck is a DVSKOREA, and are they any good? I can’t seem to find the company anywhere so it may just be a no name Korean company…

Arachne 2011-06-22 05:20:52 UTC #12

You could perform a quality scan and a TRT on your BenQ. But one answer maybe to purchase a Sammy as cheap as you can get, and use that for reading/ripping purposes. That’s the setup in both my beasts - one drive for burning duties, and a Sammy for reading/ripping.

Eases the load on both as well, I’ve not had to replace a drive in a couple of years at least

As for the DVSKOREA drive…I asked myself the same question when you first mentioned it, I have no idea. Pepst is Master of the Unknown, perhaps he can shed a bit of light on it?

Chad_Bronson 2011-06-22 09:27:27 UTC #13

Makes sense my friend

But Arachne you seem to have some knowledge on dyes. Care to shed some light on the Ritek G / Ritek F series, compared to CMC AM3 / other CMC varieties?

What are Ritek and CMC like as a whole?

As a side note, can we all verify that Samsung burners, whilst not the best of the best burners (compared to, say, LiteOn or other brands) but they are still pretty good?