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yetanotherid · 25th January 2011, 12:58

Okay, for completeness of info..... for some reason I've found Verbatim DVD+R discs burn to a slightly lesser quality than their DVD-R... on average. However, I'm fairly sure if I buy +R blanks it's generally because the local shop is out of -R and generally when I end up buying +R they're printable discs, so I couldn't say whether it's because they're printable discs, whether it's because my burners simply burn to -R discs better than +R or whether there's for some unknown reason, a quality difference between the -R and +R versions, but I'm not going to take forum here-say and an inaccurate pole (a whole 69 respondents in total) as proof Verbatim's quality has dropped. Especially not while you're unable to post screenshots of better quality burns than the burns I'm getting with Verbatim discs today. Did you notice the last screen shot was MCC004 and how good the burn was?

For the record, I've got a Samsung burner in amongst my collection of Pioneer burners, and during the last week I've burned a lot of discs, initially with a spindle of printable DVD+R and then with a spindle of DVD-R. The Samsung burner was spitting out so many coasters using the DVD+R discs I was ready to pull it out and throw it away, but since I started on the DVD-R spindle it's been burning to a quality pretty close to that of the Pioneer burners. I guess if I only owned a single Samsung burner I could start a thread in a forum and moan about the diminishing quality of Verbatim DVD+R discs, but unfortunately I don't.

The trouble is there's so many variables when it comes to burning discs. I've had days when I've burned a bunch of discs (and I'm talking about using discs from the same spindle) when every burn has been average, at least for Verbatim. Then the next day I return to finish the burning and suddenly I'm burning to a better quality for what seems to be no apparent reason. I sometimes wonder whether the ambient temperature makes a noticeable difference... and therefore the temperature inside the drive itself.... and I've wondered whether sometimes it's simply because I haven't used the burners for a while and initially the discs spinning around are disturbing the dust which has accumulated inside and it effects the burn quality for a while. And I've never been able to explain why a particular burner will burn several average quality discs in a row, then just as I'm getting annoyed it'll produce a couple of excellent quality burns. I doubt it's because the quality varies dramatically from one disc to another.

Also for the record.... as I'm fussy about the burn quality when I'm archiving stuff, if the burn's not pretty good I throw the disc away and burn it again. Sometimes I throw away something like 1 in 5, which I probably did when burning using the DVD+R spindle, but much of that was courtesy of the Samsung burner. So far, now I've nearly worked my way through a 100 spindle of DVD-R discs (and it's such a relief to get all that hard drive space back) I've maybe thrown away 1 in 20 and the burns are all pretty close (on average) to the burn in the second screenshot I posted (post #25).

Anyway..... after all my own experiences with Verbatim discs over the last few years.... am I willing to say I'm confident Verbatim's disc quality has changed? Well I don't burn using DVD+Rs often enough to form a confident opinion there but when it comes to DVD-Rs I'm confident it hasn't changed at all. Have you shown me anything which points to your contention of Verbatim's quality having dropped in the last few years being correct? Not anything close to substantial I can see, and you've not been able to offer examples of burns you've made in the past which are better quality than the examples I've posted from burns made in the last few days. Anecdotal stories of discs being manufactured in India instead of the U.S. or China or wherever they were originally made aren't proof of anything either. Manufacturer's move their factories to places like India because the labour is cheaper, not because they have to relinquish control over the quality of their products by doing so.

25th January 2011, 12:58	#38 \| Link
yetanotherid Banned Join Date: Apr 2008 Posts: 723	Okay, for completeness of info..... for some reason I've found Verbatim DVD+R discs burn to a slightly lesser quality than their DVD-R... on average. However, I'm fairly sure if I buy +R blanks it's generally because the local shop is out of -R and generally when I end up buying +R they're printable discs, so I couldn't say whether it's because they're printable discs, whether it's because my burners simply burn to -R discs better than +R or whether there's for some unknown reason, a quality difference between the -R and +R versions, but I'm not going to take forum here-say and an inaccurate pole (a whole 69 respondents in total) as proof Verbatim's quality has dropped. Especially not while you're unable to post screenshots of better quality burns than the burns I'm getting with Verbatim discs today. Did you notice the last screen shot was MCC004 and how good the burn was? For the record, I've got a Samsung burner in amongst my collection of Pioneer burners, and during the last week I've burned a lot of discs, initially with a spindle of printable DVD+R and then with a spindle of DVD-R. The Samsung burner was spitting out so many coasters using the DVD+R discs I was ready to pull it out and throw it away, but since I started on the DVD-R spindle it's been burning to a quality pretty close to that of the Pioneer burners. I guess if I only owned a single Samsung burner I could start a thread in a forum and moan about the diminishing quality of Verbatim DVD+R discs, but unfortunately I don't. The trouble is there's so many variables when it comes to burning discs. I've had days when I've burned a bunch of discs (and I'm talking about using discs from the same spindle) when every burn has been average, at least for Verbatim. Then the next day I return to finish the burning and suddenly I'm burning to a better quality for what seems to be no apparent reason. I sometimes wonder whether the ambient temperature makes a noticeable difference... and therefore the temperature inside the drive itself.... and I've wondered whether sometimes it's simply because I haven't used the burners for a while and initially the discs spinning around are disturbing the dust which has accumulated inside and it effects the burn quality for a while. And I've never been able to explain why a particular burner will burn several average quality discs in a row, then just as I'm getting annoyed it'll produce a couple of excellent quality burns. I doubt it's because the quality varies dramatically from one disc to another. Also for the record.... as I'm fussy about the burn quality when I'm archiving stuff, if the burn's not pretty good I throw the disc away and burn it again. Sometimes I throw away something like 1 in 5, which I probably did when burning using the DVD+R spindle, but much of that was courtesy of the Samsung burner. So far, now I've nearly worked my way through a 100 spindle of DVD-R discs (and it's such a relief to get all that hard drive space back) I've maybe thrown away 1 in 20 and the burns are all pretty close (on average) to the burn in the second screenshot I posted (post #25). Anyway..... after all my own experiences with Verbatim discs over the last few years.... am I willing to say I'm confident Verbatim's disc quality has changed? Well I don't burn using DVD+Rs often enough to form a confident opinion there but when it comes to DVD-Rs I'm confident it hasn't changed at all. Have you shown me anything which points to your contention of Verbatim's quality having dropped in the last few years being correct? Not anything close to substantial I can see, and you've not been able to offer examples of burns you've made in the past which are better quality than the examples I've posted from burns made in the last few days. Anecdotal stories of discs being manufactured in India instead of the U.S. or China or wherever they were originally made aren't proof of anything either. Manufacturer's move their factories to places like India because the labour is cheaper, not because they have to relinquish control over the quality of their products by doing so.