Poor Quality Unbranded DVD-Rs From Dabs.com

[acanthis]

This might be useful info for anyone in the UK. I am currently in the middle of a bitter row with Dabs.com over this product:

http://www.dabs.com/uk/channels/hardware/storage/productView.htm?quicklinx=2HB3

I have so far been unable to burn any useable disks in either my Pioneer 106D or BTC 1004. They either fail at lead-in, burn as coasters, or are unreadable on any DVD-ROM drive/DVD player that I have access to.

There are visible dye flaws on the surface of 50% of the disks, no manufacturer's markings and DVDINFOPRO reports a blank manufacturer ID. The only distinguishing marks are a white top for inket labelling and the lettering P.A.G.-02 around the hub.

Beware if you are thinking of buying these. Dabs will NOT refund your money claiming that it is the customer's fault if the disks are unwriteable.

I bought them for test purposes and would have been content to settle with using them as data only, limiting them to a couple of gig, but they're not even fit for that!

I am steaming mad ... to put it bluntly! As I said to them, I don't expect perfection on unbranded media but for f***'s sake, a failure rate of less than 100% would be nice!

Beware!

[alexnoe]

"unbranded" always means "Poor quality"...

[GMH]

I wouldn't say that - I use unbranded Ritek G03 and 04's all the time. Some of the worst discs I've ever had have been branded ones, like Vivastar or Memorex, for example.

You can't make a sweeping statement like that, especially when the big name brands are usually made by the same companies knocking out "unbranded" discs, many of which are the same quality and not some B grade effort made on a Friday 2 minutes before the QA department went home...

[alexnoe]

Ritek G03/G04 is usually not sold as unbranded. They are, if they don't have a label, at least advertised as 'ritek'.