Last summer I bought a SONY DVD recorder and have transcribed a sizeable number of programs recorded off-the-air (on RW discs) to MPEG II format using Any Video Converter Pro and a Pinnacle editor. In February I tried to resolve an unrelated issue on the SONY via changing some parameters for the setup. Before that time, the device never asked for the format type (the options are “Video” and “VR”), but now I must choose. However, either way I lose. None of the discs I have formatted since February are recognized by my PC. Since I have both a Toshiba model SD-R5372 burner and a Samsung SH-S182M burner on my system and neither can read the discs, I assume the problem is that I am somehow creating a non-compatible format on the SONY recorder. (Resetting the recorder settings to factory default did not help.) However, since one never knows for sure just what evil lies in those Microsoft Windows updates we are compelled to install, I can’t really be sure. (I am running Win2K, SP4.)
When I tried to format a DVD on my PC to see if the SONY recorder would read it I was surprised to find out that my NTI CD & DVD Maker siftware has no option for formatting a DVD, leaving me confused as to why the SONY recorder requires a format but my PC doesn’t seem to need to.
My questions are: 1) does anyone have any clue as to what has happened to make my recorder-created discs unreadable?, 2) how do I get around or fix the problem a) on new discs, and b) on the discs already burned?, and 3) what are the underlying format standards for DVDs?
George Mondie