Why DVD+R(W) is superior to DVD-R(W) Article

[The Edge]

An interesting read.
Why DVD+R(W) is superior to DVD-R(W) - (http://www.cdfreaks.com/article/113/)


Bren

[Hiro2k]

I learned. Nice Article, it's worth the read.

[mrbass]

I didn't even have to read the article...I have both...erasing dvd-rw takes 2 mins... erasing dvd+rw takes 20 seconds. That's all I need to know.

[erbuk]

Have you also, like me, noticed that the plus discs are much more reliable? I thought it had to do with crappy media but after reading this article i'm no longer sure. Maybe this is also system related? Looks like the error-correction in plus is much more advanced.

[Xayd]

How many people only burn on ReWritable disks?

I only have one, the one that came with my burner, they're too expensive and you never know how many burns you'll get from one.

I don't deny that + has some better features for saving plain ole data, but if you're talking about video, - is still the better format for standalone compatibility. The numbers don't lie, every test done shows - single write disks working in more standalones than + single write disks.

[erbuk]

Strange, my experience is that all players that can read -R also can read +R. And fact is that very few players have had any problems at all. It's much less problematic than it was when CD-R came to the market.

RW discs (yes I use them a lot for backup purposes and in my dvd-recorder) are more problematic.But I don't see much difference between the formats there either. It's more the fact that they are rewritable that causes the problem. And many of the players that can't read DVDRW also have problems with CD-RW.

I'm sure that if you tested a hundred players you would find a few percents difference in some direction. But you would probably find the same difference if you compared two -R discs of different brands or two discs burned with two different -R burners.

On the other hand, I haven't tried more than 20-30 players so I can't say for sure that I'm right. And I haven't read the tests that you are talking about. Where can I find them?

[sarahjh69]

almost all my media is datasafe dvd-rw
its 89p a disk and is totally reliable.
I only ever use it once, so who cares
how many times you can burn to it.
(i'm using bulkcrap orange now, as it works reliably at 4x
and only cost 75p a disk)
why is + media more reliable than - ??
thats easy...- media is bulk produced and cheap
+ isn't.

[erbuk]

So why do you use RW-discs when you only burn once on them? And where do you find them for 89p (I suppose you are talking about Brittish pence)? Please tell me cause I'm very interested in buing a few if that is really the price.

And what burner are you using. I can't find any burners that supports 4x DVD-RW burning. Do you need some tweaked firmware to do that and in that case; where can I find it?

The plus discs are manufactured and sold just like the minus discs. I buy the same Datawrite R discs, in 100-pack, in both formats and the difference in price is not that big anymore where I live.

[The Edge]

89p and 75p?
I would like to know too. Even a web address.
The cheapest i've seen locally is about €2 yoyo and disc.


Bren

[alexnoe]

Some notes:

- you cannot erase a DVD+RW at all, except for Ricoh drives. I wonder when people will learn the difference between erasing and overwriting.
- the article describes and compares the formats themselves, and NOT the crappy implementation which current DVD+drives have. So to say, it describes its potential.
It shows that the DVD+ Alliance has boasted with the defect management feature for over a year now, but didn't implement it into any drive (and thus has been fooling customers)

Plus discs are currently more reliable because Princo doesn't sell DVD+R media.
And + discs will be more reliable as long as there are fools using Princo media!

The PC Professional has found some time ago that there is no DVD+ media available atm that can sustain 3 weaks of exposure to sun, while (few) DVD-R media did not take damage.

Good - discs are more reliable than plus discs, but there is nothing in the + section which is as crappy as Princo or Vivastar minus media.

The german CT 11/03 has found that DVD+RW discs usually die long before 1000 rewrite cycles, while DVD-RW (except for Princo and such shit) can do 1000 cycles (Pioneer 2x DVD-RW even more).
The problem is not the + standard of course, but only the crappy firmwares of burners are to blaim for this.

+ is a nice standard, but that's all. The drives are far away from implementing it properly

@erbuk:

LOL!
Plus discs use the very same error correction scheme as DVD-ROM and DVD-.
+ *allows* to relocate damaged data when using +MRW, but no drive supports that so far, although they have boasted with this feature for more than a year now.
Also, this requires of course to read these discs in the burner, because a DVD player or DVD-ROM will of course not relocate anything.

[erbuk]

You don't erase a -rw-disc or a harddrive eiter if you fast format. What you want is to reset the disc so that you can rewrite it completely. How that is done in not very interesting but how long it takes is.

Yes I agree with you that there is too much talking bullshit going on in this business. I feel I can't trust anyone. The companies, of course, have to give a positive image of their product, that's their job. And then you have the "I bought a minus burner, so minus-burners must be the best otherwise I'm stupid"-factor that has quite an impact in this forum and other user-forums.

I have never stated that the lower failure rate when burning plus discs is cause of the error-correction, it was a question, nothing else. I just know that the difference there for me. I use both plus and minus burners. And the difference is there even when I use the same media brand (but that of course doesn't have to mean the same manufacturer). But it might as well be a coincidence. I don't have the resources needed to make real scientific test of this and I don't think that anyone has done that. You need to burn thousands of discs with a large number of burners to settle this.

When it comes to the sun-test; yes I have seen that done with CD-R:s. And really, the only thing it tells you is that some discs lives longer in direct sun-light than others. It's not scientific proof that the same discs would last longer in real life. It's not even an indication that they would. There are lots of other factors, more relevant than sunlight, to consider if you want to try to estimate the lifespan of optical discs.

You can't say that -rw discs can take more or less rewrites than +rw discs. Glad you agree that it is not system related. And no magazine, German or not, have the resources to determine this in a scientific way. You would have to burn several discs from different production batches of every brand of +rw and -rw discs on all available burner-models. And that's not what they have done. The only thing their test tells you is that the Pioneer disc they tested obviously had good quality. But that doesn't have to mean that the Pioneer disc I will buy today has the same quality or that it will perform as well in other burners than the once they used.

[Rober2D2]

I have recently bought DVD-writer (LG GSA-4040). As I didn't know much about +,- media I bought a device that burned, +,- and DVD-RAM (A good burner. I only lack the CD-MRW feature).

For the moment I am using DVD-R, not because it is better, but because I can't read DVD+ media with my DVD reader, nor can't the majority of my friends. May be I will try DVD+R when multiformat readers become more extent. It is a problem of incompatibilities, not a problem of which one is technically better

Apart from that, I find it difficult to find DVD-R media in Madrid. Most shops are plenty of +R and +RW media, simply beacause people don't want them, while they are empty of -R and 2x -RW media.