I'm looking for a DVD burner for my PC, but want one that plays/records onto DVD-RAM since my home unit does so & I want to be able to copy home made videos I make with it to DVD-R. Can anybody recommend a good DVD Burner for PCs that also accepts DVD-RAM?
Try www.newegg.com , they are reputable and the prices are good. How about this one : http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16827136047
Does +, - and Ram , does not get much better than this : DVD+R 16X DVD+RW 8X DVD-R 16X DVD-RW 6X CD-R 40X CD-RW 24X DVD+R DL 4X DVD-RAM 5X
Hey buscuit - I would agree with 72morgan. I just picked up an open box Panasonic DMR-E85H Recorder (DVD-R/DVD-RAM) with 120gb HDD @ HHGregg for $75.00. I had been looking for a way to back up shows recorded to my Dishnet PVR, and at that price I couldn't pass it up! After burning a few shows to DVD-R and then copying them to my PC's HDD to edit out comercials, compress, make menus, etc..., I soon realized that I could only get 1 use of this "original" DVD-R and then would have to use another one to burn the edited program(s) to - basically wasting a DVD-R just to transfer from DVD Recorder to PC HDD. Anyway, I finally found some blank DVD-RAM media (this was no small task to find locally!). I had an old Hitachi DVD-ROM drive that was supposed to be able to read DVD-RAM, but for some reason it would not recognize the disc I had burned. I was looking for something at Sam's Club and stumbled accross this very model that 72morgan linked to. I took it home, replaced the old Hitachi DVD-ROM drive with this LG GSA-4163B and it immediately recognized the DVD-RAM disc!!! I have not had time to test burning anything (DVD+/-R/RW), but if your main concern is reading DVD-RAM then this will definitely to the trick. My only regret is that I paid almost $80.00 at Sam's, and 72morgan's link is $52.00. Oh well, live and learn!
jpc00, I have a Pioneer 810-h with Tivo. I used to take shows from my Pioneer on a DVD-R and bring them to my PC for editing too. I was wasting a lot of discs too. One use,until I bought some DVD-RW`s. A little slower when the pioneer erases them but cheaper.
72morgan - That's what I originally intended to do, but my Panasonic will only record to DVD-R and DVD-RAM, not DVD-RW. As I said, I got this as an "open box" and it didn't have a manual, remote control, or even a power cord. As it was the last one of this model they had, I had to rely on the salesman's "knowledge" about it's capabilities, and he said if it would record to DVD-R then it should also record to DVD-RW. I should have researched on the net first but figured that at the price they were asking it would be gone by the time I could back, so I just took his word for it. I have flashed to the latest firmware but still unable to do DVD-RW. There may be a hacked firmware available somewhere that would allow me to, but now that I have this Tri-Format DVD Burner from LG I think I'll just stick to DVD-RAM for now. Thanks for the suggestion though!
They are Samsungs biggest competitor in Korea. The LG stands for Lucky and Goldstar. Two companies That merged a while back in order to compete better with Samsung. They make good stuff , I have never heard any complaints.
buscuit - Try this link and you can search for reviews/comments on the LG GSA-4163B. http://www.videohelp.com I read somewhere that they are a notch below Plextor, NEC, and Pioneer, about on par with LiteOn and Sony. But I don't think any of the "Big 3" make writers that can do DVD-RAM, could be wrong.
I noticed that one of the formats supported and mentioned about the LG recorder is "DVD+R DL". What is this? I've never heard of it. Is it something new or is it maybe just a variation of DVD+R? Just curious.
buscuit - "DVD+R DL" is Dual Layer DVD+R format. These discs will hold 8.5GB as opposed to the 4.7GB that a normal single layer DVD+R disc will. There are 2 dye layers on the one side instead of just one. There used to be 2 sided discs, called "Flippers", but these required you to take the disc out and flip it over during play-back. The big drawback to DL discs right now is price - nearly $3.50/disc. As far as burners, I would recommend buying one that is capable of doing DL because they aren't much more expensive than single layer burners and they give you the capabilities in case the price of DL media ever drops. If newegg.com still has that LG for around $52.00 I would jump on that. As 72morgan said, it will do DL as well as the DVD-RAM you originally asked about and it is a great price.
How can you go wrong with this drive, It will burn DVD`s with the + format and the - [ minus ] format . It will even handle the latest and greatest to come out , the Dual Layered disc. It is even backward compatible and will burn CD`s . And for the piece de resistance, it will even take that failure of a disc DVD-RAM. What more could a person want????? Good Luck and Happy Burning...
If you are not comfortable with LG. ALLMEDIA has a Pioneer for the same price. Link below : http://www.allmediaoutlet.com/allmedia/promo.jsp?campaign=email
The Pioneer won't write to DVD-RAM, it only reads it. LG is the only bargain-priced burner that that I know of that will write to DVD-RAM. The Panasonic Multi-Drive is much more expensive. I see a lot of ppl knocking the LG, but I've had a GSA-4120B for about 3 months now and I am quite happy with it so far, it has been much more reliable that the I/O Magic 1016IM I replaced. From what I read on the forums, their failure rate doesn't seem any worse than any other burner.
