DVD or DVD+RW?

Posted by: Simon Crosland on 04 November 2002

So my wife has pursuaded me to enter the modern world and buy a DVD player before Christmas.

Ideally I would like to replace one black box - the VCR - with a recordable DVD, rather than adding to the black box count.

However, is this a pointless exercise given the DVD format wars?

What is the current wisdom? Buy a cheap DVD player and chuck it away once the format wars die down, or pay a bit more and get one of the Philips DVD+RW machines and junk the (cheap) VCR?

Cheers,
Simon

ps - what's the betting that by the time this is all over I have been persuaded to replace the aging TV with a plasma or lcd as well ... !?
Posted on: 04 November 2002 by Stuart M
I bought a DVD+RW as the disks it creates will play on standard DVD players and am in the process of transfering my old videos to DVD to save space and make them more accessable. Even if the DVD+RW doesn't win the format wars the DVD's it creates should be playable on future DVD players.

Really simple, record the tape onto the DVD+RW overnight then chop it up into chapters the next day. Only thing if the video is a bit worn and the picture not stable then the DVD tends to blank out that bit of the video, not much of a problem as it tends to be unwatchable anyway.

To err is human; to really foul it up requires a computer.
Posted on: 05 November 2002 by Simon Crosland
Stuart,

Thanks for the info. What's the picture quality like with the DVD+RW? I have seen some very blocky digital tv pictures (dtt and cable) and would not want a DVD recorder that did the same.

Simon
Posted on: 05 November 2002 by Stuart M
Going from VHS ---> DVD if you use the 4 hour setting the quality is as good as VHS normal speed and this seems OK for transfers. 6 hour is not very good but could be handy if you needed that amount of time in one go. For recording I've only tried the 3 hour setting recording of terestrial digital and that worked well. Presume the 2 and 1hr settings are even better.

Using Philips DVDR-890

To err is human; to really foul it up requires a computer.