I would just like to very simply tell you the different disc formats and what they are used for. We are not going to get too technical as it all just gets too confusing. The point is, we just need to know what suits our needs and this list might help when choosing a dvd drive for your computer, or it might help you figure out which disc you should be burning your data on to.
CD-R: (Compact disc-recorder)This is a normal Compact disc that yo can record information to. Once the disc has been written to it is permanent. CD-R usually hold around 700mb of data
CD-RW: (Compact disc-rewriteable)You can also write data to this compact disc, however this time you can wipe the disc clean and reuse it over and over.
DVD-R: digital Versatile Disc(formally Digital Video Disc) -R was the first DVD to arrive on the scene. A lot of people still use this disc format as their DVD burner drives are only compatible with this type. You can not erase a disc after writing on it. DVD discs usually hold around 4.7gb of data.
DVD+R: Is a newer, more developed DVD disc format which offers a bit more success rate when burning discs. To use these discs. the data is permanently written to the disc.
DVD-RW: This format allows you to erase the data and files from the disc and write more to the disc. Normal home dvd players do not really like rewritable dvd discs.
DVD+RW: You can also re-write onto this type of disc.
DVD+/-R DL: Is a DVD dual or double sided disc. It is not new technology but has only recently been available to the public. DVD movies are often on a dual layer disc. It can hold around 9gb of data.
DVD-RAM: This re-rewritable 4.7GB Random Access Memory disc can be rewritten over 100,000 times and lasts for 30 years, it operates like a mini hard drive. Very useful for recording movies which can be watched while recording something else. (time slip recording). Editing is an extremely useful feature, delete want you don’t want and keep what you do, however it can only be played back on DVD-RAM players. To make it playable on other formats the files will have to be converted from VRO files (RAM) to VOB files (DVD). (Contributed by Pete)
Notes:
- To find out what format disc your home DVD player likes, Buy a few different discs in small quantities for testing. My player likes a Sony dvd-R disc.. It does not play a verbatim disc. It also plays DVD+R discs, however it depends on the brand.
- To find out which format your dvd burner is compatible with check its properties. My DVD burner shows DVDRW because it is compatible with nearly every type of disc including CD-R, CD-RW, DVD-R, DVD+R, DVD-RW, DVD-R DL and DVD+R DL. To find the properties right click on the icon in my computer and choose properties from the menu.
- This article What is a CD-R, CD-RW, DVD-R, DVD+R, or a DVD-RW is a brief and simple descriptions of the different disc formats. For more information type your query into Google.
- Dual layer dvd burners are usually compatible with all disc formats that have previously been made.
- DVD Movies do not fit on a 4.7gb dvd disc. You have to copy them to a dual layer dvd disc, or shrink the movie with DVD Shrink .
- Bluray fits an entire movie onto a disc. See this article about Bluray vs DVD disc.