DVD write?

On Jul 17, 2:13 am, Ron Hardin wrote:
I'm getting to the point where I want to consider backing up to DVD
instead of CD. How much data can I write on a DVD? It's 702 MB
for CD. My planning program needs to know this.

Does your typical Dell laptop with DVD write capability write DVD's
the same as it writes CD's (guessing : recognizes inserted blank DVD?
but that's too late, since the DVD doesn't get inserted until after
write-to-cd is clicked; what's the procedure?)?
--
Ron Hardin


On the internet, nobody knows you're a jerk.

4.5 GB Single layer
9 GB double layer (needs a double layer drive and media).

You need a program capable of burning dvds, ad dvd writing is not
built in to XP. Nero is one, among many.

"You can never tell what a size means." Truth in packaging? Microsoft new
math? Reminds me of the old joke about the Russian condoms, small sized, but I
won't tell it... Ben Myers

On Tue, 17 Jul 2007 18:27:27 GMT, Ron Hardin wrote:

Journey wrote:

On Tue, 17 Jul 2007 18:54:22 +0100, Colin Wilson
o.uk wrote:

I'm getting to the point where I want to consider backing up to DVD
instead of CD. How much data can I write on a DVD? It's 702 MB
for CD. My planning program needs to know this.

~4.4Gb (4483Mb) for a single layer DVD written as a data disc.

I've always heard 4.7GB, and I think the disk packaging says that. I
wonder what accounts for the difference?

You can never tell what a size means. I have this trouble all the time with
partitioning software, whether K means 1000 or 1024, whether M means 1000*1000
or 1000*1024 or 1024*1024, and whether G means 1000*1000*1000 or 1000*1000*1024
or 1000*1024*1024 or 1024*1024*1024. You see all versions.

"I'm getting to the point where I want to consider backing up to DVD
instead of CD. How much data can I write on a DVD?"

I've been at that point for two years.

A single layer DVD will hold about 4.7 DECIMAL Gigabytes (e.g.
4,700,000,000 bytes). A dual layer DVD will hold about 9GB (again,
decimal).

The process is pretty much the same as using CDs, with just a couple of
caveats:

1. Multi-session (adding material to a not-yet-full media) is
hit-or-miss and I don't recommend trying to use it. It will work if
everything is right and compatible, but not all burners, not all
software and not all non-burner DVD drives (in which you might need to
read the resulting disc) will handle it properly.

2. Although I do use them, I really don't trust dual-layer DVD media.
I have had no problems with them, but it just seems superficially lower
in reliability. So I try to limit my use to situations when I really,
really want the extra capacity in a single piece of media (e.g. when ONE
FILE is larger than 4.7GB).

3. DON'T USE "RW" MEDIA FOR LONG TERM ARCHIVAL BACKUPS. I recommend
this rule for CDs also. RW media, by definition, can be restored to a
"blank" state, and SOMETIMES this happens all by itself, over time. In
other words, the data "fades" (takes months or years, but it clearly can
happen). The cause here MAY be that the burn laser was marginally low
in power, but to me it's the end result that matters, not the cause.
Once the data is lost, why it was lost is almost irrelevant.

4. DVDs fail from the outside in, usually due to delamination due to
flexing of the disc (a DVD is two layers of plastic bonded together; a
CD is a single piece of plastic with coatings on one side). Although I
don't always follow this rule myself, good practice is to fill the DVDs
to 90% full and leave the outermost 10% blank.

5. Avoid the temptation to use the highest available speeds.
Experience with optical media suggests strongly that burn quality
decreases with burn speed, due to both laser power issues and mechanical
stability of the media and drive (e.g. media vibration). I normally
stick to 4x or even 2x, even when using media and drives that will
nominally support 8x.

6. If you have been using "packet writing" for making CDs
(drag-to-disc, InCD, DLA, etc.) (bad news, by the way), You will have to
learn to use "full" burning software (Roxio, Nero or another) to make
your DVDs (which is what you really should do for CDs). These packages
all have a box in the main window where you specify the media type (CD,
DVD or DVD-DL) before starting the burn, as part of the process of
creating the "layout" to be burned.

Barry Watzman wrote:
6. If you have been using "packet writing" for making CDs
(drag-to-disc, InCD, DLA, etc.) (bad news, by the way), You will have to
learn to use "full" burning software (Roxio, Nero or another) to make
your DVDs (which is what you really should do for CDs). These packages
all have a box in the main window where you specify the media type (CD,
DVD or DVD-DL) before starting the burn, as part of the process of
creating the "layout" to be burned.

I use copy file, and select the D drive as the destination. It seems
to stash the list away somewhere, until you say actually write (what's
saved) to disk. I gather that's just XP software. It builds its image
of the CD and then writes it. No problems with it that I know of.

I gather it won't work if I insert a DVD when it complains no disk
in drive, rather than a CD. (Making it ask makes the odds better that
the right program gets control of the drive; otherwise it's always
asking what action to perform in some other program.)
--


On the internet, nobody knows you're a jerk.

What you describe is Microsoft's Windows XP CD burning capability. It
actually is a full ISO write, and the "burn engine" is Roxio's. It
isn't "drag to disc", although it does look like it (no writing is done
at the time, unlike "drag to disc" ... you are correct, it keeps a copy
of what is to be written in a hidden folder and then does the actual
burn (and erases the copy) later, when you tell it to actually do the write.

MS did this for a couple of reasons, among them both to "dumb it down"
and to keep the code very simple.

Time to leave the children's toys behind, however, and learn to use a
REAL optical disc writing program, because this feature is only for CDs,
it does not support DVDs, therefore you don't really have a choice.


Ron Hardin wrote:
Barry Watzman wrote:
6. If you have been using "packet writing" for making CDs
(drag-to-disc, InCD, DLA, etc.) (bad news, by the way), You will have to
learn to use "full" burning software (Roxio, Nero or another) to make
your DVDs (which is what you really should do for CDs). These packages
all have a box in the main window where you specify the media type (CD,
DVD or DVD-DL) before starting the burn, as part of the process of
creating the "layout" to be burned.

I use copy file, and select the D drive as the destination. It seems
to stash the list away somewhere, until you say actually write (what's
saved) to disk. I gather that's just XP software. It builds its image
of the CD and then writes it. No problems with it that I know of.

I gather it won't work if I insert a DVD when it complains no disk
in drive, rather than a CD. (Making it ask makes the odds better that
the right program gets control of the drive; otherwise it's always
asking what action to perform in some other program.)

It's 4.7 DECIMAL gigabytes; that is 4,700,000,000 bytes.

But Microsoft and Windows use Binary gigabytes. A binary gigabyte is
1,073,741,824 bytes. So a DVD that holds 4,700,000,000 decimal
gigabytes will only hold 4.377 binary gigabytes.


Journey wrote:
On Tue, 17 Jul 2007 18:54:22 +0100, Colin Wilson
o.uk wrote:

I'm getting to the point where I want to consider backing up to DVD
instead of CD. How much data can I write on a DVD? It's 702 MB
for CD. My planning program needs to know this.
~4.4Gb (4483Mb) for a single layer DVD written as a data disc.

I've always heard 4.7GB, and I think the disk packaging says that. I
wonder what accounts for the difference?

"You should not use the Windows program that came with PC"

Windows XP has no DVD writing capability at all. CD, yes, but not DVD.
You need some 3rd party product.


Rich/rerat wrote:
Ron Hardin,
You can approximately get 4.5GB on a DVD disc, some of the factors on the
final size is the way your "third-party" dvd writing program formats the
disc. And what you are storing on the discs, music, video, image, data.

If your dell came with a DVD Writer installed, you should have a third party
DVD Writing program already installed on the HDD, unless you reformatted the
HDD, or the Reinstallation Disc for that program. Usually its a lite version
of the program offered for retail. You should not use the Windows program
that came with PC, it's very stripped down version. And might not have all
the features that you need.

"I believe that drag to disk works for DVDs, but it is something
that many people have found very unreliable."

I don't think it does, but that's beside the point. As you alluded to
(not entirely for the right reasons) it simply shouldn't be used. Not
even on CDs, much less DVDs.

Aside from a lot of potential compatibility problems with the software
itself, packet writing (which is what "Drag to Disc" is) produces a
non-standard, non-ISO media. There are all kinds of implications to
this, all of them bad.

The right way to burn both CD and DVD optical media is to open up the
main window a full optical media burning product (e.g. Roxio, Nero or
whatever), create a layout and burn it as an ISO-standard media.

"As Tom said, the capacity of a normal DVD is 4.7G. If your DVD
recorder supports it (most new ones do I think), you can use a dual
layer DVD that has twice that capacity."

That's 4.7 DECIMAL gigabytes; about 4.2 to 4.3 BINARY gigabytes
(Microsoft and Windows normally show binary gigabytes).

Also the capacity of dual layer DVD is a bit (but significantly) less
than twice the capacity of single layer DVD. About 9 DECIMAL gigabytes.

On Wed, 18 Jul 2007 21:10:09 -0400, Barry Watzman
wrote:

The right way to burn both CD and DVD optical media is to open up the
main window a full optical media burning product (e.g. Roxio, Nero or
whatever), create a layout and burn it as an ISO-standard media.

I think that's the bottom line. It makes sense that staying with
ISO-standard media is the safest way to go.

What about CD-RW's and DVD-RW's? Does that mean burn them as
ISO-standard, and then if things change, re-burn them as ISO-standard?

I recommend not using RW media at all, period.

As packet written media, it's non-standard. It's not only non-ISO, but
in many cases you can't read the disc on any computer other than the one
it's made on or one with identical software. [This is because of the
packet writing non-ISO format, not because it's RW; you can burn this
format on non-RW media also, but it's rarely done.]

But more to the point, it's slower, it's more expensive, and the data
sometimes "fades" (disappears on it's own after a period of time (weeks
to a couple of years)). It's definitely not for archival storage. And
this is because it's "RW" media, which you CAN also burn as ISO-standard
(but the data might still fade anyway).


Journey wrote:
On Wed, 18 Jul 2007 21:10:09 -0400, Barry Watzman
wrote:

The right way to burn both CD and DVD optical media is to open up the
main window a full optical media burning product (e.g. Roxio, Nero or
whatever), create a layout and burn it as an ISO-standard media.

I think that's the bottom line. It makes sense that staying with
ISO-standard media is the safest way to go.

What about CD-RW's and DVD-RW's? Does that mean burn them as
ISO-standard, and then if things change, re-burn them as ISO-standard?