DVD burner vs DVD ROM to burn

[chewbkka]

I am going to buy a new DVD burner but when scrolling though different forums, many of the users are using a dvd rom to burn with DVD shrink and decrypter. So I asked what is the difference between the two? and second is there one a prefer burner over the other.? can you use a DVD rom to burn aDVD using Shrink and Decrypter?

[nwg]

I am going to buy a new DVD burner but when scrolling though different forums, many of the users are using a dvd rom to burn with DVD shrink and decrypter. So I asked what is the difference between the two? and second is there one a prefer burner over the other.? can you use a DVD rom to burn aDVD using Shrink and Decrypter?


You cannot burn a DVD with a DVD ROM drive. They are read only. What some people do is use a DVD ROM to read the source DVD and then use their DVD Writer just to burn with.

[writersblock29]

@chewbkka

What you've been hearing about is most likely the practice of bitsetting. Bitsetting is finalizing a +R disk as DVD-ROM rather than a DVD+R, and vastly improves your compatibility with older set top players. As NWG stated, a DVD-ROM drive cannot do anything other than read a DVD... to finalize a disk as a DVD-ROM, you still need a burner which supports bitsetting -- or a way to flash the firmware of a drive that originally doesn't. Unless you're having playback issues with your set tops (or would like to lend your backups to friends without having to worry about whether or not they'll play on their machines), this isn't anything that you'll have to worry about. If your drive does support it, it's really just a matter of making sure that either DVD Shrink or Nero is set to perform this function. Doing a Google search on the word "bitsetting," or maybe even "Book-type setting," will point you in a good direction to read more on this.

[Video Dude]

Many of the DVD+R burners come with the Book-type setting already set to DVD-ROM by default out of the box.

[writersblock29]

@Video Dude

True. Too bad Sony and NEC aren't taking the hint! I'd much rather use an official firmware which will allow for bitsetting, instead of maybe-this-will-work-without-locking-up-your-burner hacks (which -- even though most of them DO work -- void your warranty). I beleive these two manufacturers do automatically format dual layer media as DVD-ROM; so at least they've got ONE eye open. ;)