Blu-ray burner recommendations?

[Malcolm Hamilton]

Hi there,
I hope I'm not contravening some forum rule by asking for recommendations about Blu-ray burners. If so, I'll apologize in advance. If not, I'd love to hear your suggestions.
I have a Sony EX-1 and a Mac Pro (in case that makes a difference).
I've heard that an external (rather than internal) Blu-ray burner might be a better way to go.
And that's about all I know.
I will have to make the odd bigger, dual-layer backup, because I use a 32GB card as well as two 16GB cards.
Give all of that, what manufacturer, what model would you recommend?
thanks,
Malcolm

[Chris Hurd]

Moved from our XDCAM EX forum to our Blu-Ray Authoring forum.

Please use the *entire* site and post to the forum which best suits your topic.

Thanks in advance,

[Perrone Ford]

This one:

Videoguys.com - External Blu-ray MEGA Bundle for Mac with Roxio Toast 10 Titanuim Pro

[Malcolm Hamilton]

thanks for moving this Chris, and thanks for the recommendation Perrone.
Given that I already own Toast, I'll see if there's a bundle that doesn't include it (and is therefore a bit cheaper—although, I have to admit, the price isn't bad!).
I did hear once that Pioneer makes good hardware.
Regards,
Malcolm

[Richard Lucas]

I bought a US$200 LG internal unit almost 2 years ago and it never failed. Did a lot of research before the purchase and the LG units got high marks. Things might be different now, but LG quality seems to be holding up.

External units are a bit different, but find out who makes the burner part of it. That will tell you a lot.

[Barry J. Anwender]

Hi Malcom:

I use a Pioneer BDR-205 in an external enclosure from Other World Computing. I've purchased lots of stuff from them over the years and their mail order is straight forward to CANADA:

OWC Mercury Pro 12X Blu-Ray+DVD DL/CD Exte... (MRF8BDSD12X) at OWC

I have been using the Pioneer for a year and half, so far no coasters on either single layer or dual layer BDR discs I also prototype my projects on single/dual layer rewritable BDR disc, again reliable. I use Roxio Toast for blu-ray data discs and Adobe Encore CS4 for blu-ray video projects. Encore has some quirks but once you get past those, it will produce very nice results with EX-XDCAM footage. Cheers - aah :-)

[Walter Brokx]

thanks for that link!
(Been looking for a FW800 burner)

[Chris Tangey]

I note people are talking about burners that "include" Toast. My Lacie burner did, for a while anyway.
You see, I thought I had my nice little XD cam archive set up nicely, but then one day a few weeks later Toast wouldn't even open let alone burn. Why? Because apparently my TRIAL software had expired. Nowhere did Roxio or Lacie make this obvious, which is bordering on fraudulent. I bought a Lacie burner advertised as "including Toast Titanium 10" which is what I based my purchase on, it was a scam I will not forget and neither Roxio nor Lacie will reply to my emails about it.

[Malcolm Hamilton]

Chris, thank you for your warning (sorry you had this experience!).
Because of your warning I called the videoguys people (Perrone's link above) and asked very specifically about the version of Toast Titanium Pro that ships with their Blu-ray unit. I was assured that it is not a trail version... I went ahead and purchased.
I appreciate all the advice, everyone. Barry, the actual unit that comes with the videoguys bundle is the same Pioneer unit that you also recommend, so I feel pretty safe.
Regards,
Malcolm