DVD recorder

[Eric Cole]

Hello. I'm about to make the leap into DVD production. I am currently editing on a Pinnacle DV-500 PLUS (on a PC). I've done some research and from what I've read the DVD-R format is most compatible with consumer DVD players. I'm leaning towards a Panasonic DMR-E20K. It records DVD-R and DVD ROM. Has anyone else purchased one of these? How compatible are the DVD's? Is there something better out there? Thanks in advance for your help.

[Rob Lohman]

You cannot burn DVD ROM. Thus it only writes DVD-R then. I would
not go with this device, why? Because it (assumingly your
information you gave my here is correct!!) does not offer any
rewritable formats. Why you need this? For testing! It is very
easy to burn coasters with DVD burners because of the high
data rate and other complexities. It is more wise to do some
test burning before actually cutting an DVD-R (these things are
going to cost you at least $2 (us dollars) per disc).

A lot of people use Pioneer A03 or A04 for their burning. The
problem with these drives is that you need certain DVD-R's to
achieve their full burning speed. It is hoped this thing is "fixed"
in future firmware releases.

Just some thoughts from my side.

[Peter Lock]

I agree with Rob.

The Pioneer A04 I've just noticed has fallen to just a little over £200.00 here in the UK almost a third of what I paid a year ago.
DVD-R discs have fallen in price too but beware of cheap generic discs, stick to Pioneer or Apple.

[Edward Troxel]

The Panasonic drive burns DVD-R and DVD-RAM (not "rom"). DVD-RAM will not play in any standalone players and, probably, not in many DVD drives - but it IS re-writable. For more compatibility, the Pioneer drive uses DVD-R and DVD-RW - both of which work in many standalone players.

[Jeff Donald]

I use the Pioneer AO3 for my multi media projects and it works like a champ. I have upgraded the firmware to 1.68 or something and it works with most media. The advantage to using the Pioneer and Apple disks are a faster writing speed (2X). In the beginning, I had that same fear of making a great many coasters and used RW disks to test my projects. However, I burned relatively few coasters and I no longer use the RW disks.

Really look into the software if your are going to do authoring. Make sure it can work with DLT tape drives. DLT tapes are required by most duplicators. If you are just making one offs that won't be a concern.

Jeff

[Eric Cole]

Thanks for the replies. Sorry, yes, I meant DVD-Ram (not ROM). I am definately going to get the Pioneer DVR-a04 sometime soon. But for now, I am looking for a dvd recorder that I can dub to from mini-dv (Panasonic dv-2000). Most of my projects are 3 hours or longer, so I don't want to have to tie up my computer to burn DVDs. Again, thanks for the help!