Excellent DVD-R/RW drive!
Written: Jan 06 '02
|
Product Rating:
|
|
| Ease of Use: |
 |
|
|
Pros: Supports DVD-R DVD-RW CD-R CD-RW
Cons: Slower than HP 100i, won't write DVD+RW
The Bottom Line: Easy to use DVD-R/RW/CD-R/RW drive. Inexpensive media now, and its not loud at all.
|
|
|
| Atreides93's Full Review: Pioneer DVR A03 DVD-RW Burner |
I've been wanting to get a DVD recorder ever since DVD's came out and they didn't even exist yet for the home enthusiast like myself. I did a lot of research before choosing this particular model. The main reason I chose this drive was that its the only one that supports DVD-R discs. DVD-R is an older standard than DVD-RW or DVD+RW. Its much easier to find DVD-R's, and they're much cheaper than the -RW or +RW discs. I found DVD-R's for $4.29 and with tax and shipping it came out to $5.59 per disc if i buy 5 at a time. That's like buying miniDV tapes!
I don't know why people are praising the HP 100i and the DVD+RW format. I did a lot of research and DVD-R is far more compatible than DVD+RW or DVD-RW. its true that DVD+RW is better than DVD-RW, because DVD+RW has better error detection and is more suited to using it as a big floppy drive. But honestly people, why use it as a floppy drive. Its only 4.7 gigs. My hard disk is 60 gigs, and besides, a DVD+RW drive is going to be much slower than your hard disk, so you'd be crazy to use it for loading programs or files. CD's and DVD's are best suited for storage and video. They're no replacement for a hard drive.
I was also really impressed with the software that the retail kit comes with. Prassi PrimoDVD is a very easy to use DVD/CD software program that lets you write data and audio cd's. This drive will write to CD-R's and CD-RW's at 8x (for the cd-r) and 4x speed for the cd-rw. It writes at 2x for DVD-R and 1x for DVD-RW. By the way, that means it takes about 28 minutes to burn a DVD-R disc. Which isn't bad at all. Remember, that disc contains up to 2 hours of video (typically), so that's faster than copying it to a VHS tape.
The HP 100i and others like it that use DVD+RW discs, have a huge flaw. They currently only write to DVD+RW, they won't write to DVD-R or DVD+R discs. That means the only media available for them is typically over $12 each! That's about 3 times as much per disc, just so you can erase it if you want to.
HP won't say if their drive will be upgradeable to support DVD+R discs which should be cheaper.
I know its a complicated decision deciding between these two formats. Believe me, I spent days agonizing over it. Just remember one thing, no matter what, both DVD-R and DVD+RW are formats that are here to stay. So I really do think you can be happy with either drive. But if it were me, I'd get the Pioneer A03 again if I had to choose for a friend.
You'll be able to get blank DVD-R's and DVD-RW's for many years, longer than your drive will probably last anyway. And those DVD-R discs are much more likely to play in your DVD player and your relative's DVD players. It'll be a while before the RW standards are fully supported by all the DVD players out there.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 375
Operating System: Windows
|
|
|
|
Epinions.com ID:
Atreides93
|
|
Reviews written: 31
Trusted by: 0 members
|
|
|
- Add to My Yahoo!: 
- Add to Google Homepage: 
© 1999-2009 Shopping.com, Inc.