DVD burner questions

[Warren Block]

On Tue, 18 Nov 2003, Tom Parquette wrote:

> I have a few questions I hope someone can answer for me:
> 1) I've seen DVD+RW, DVD-RW, DVD+R and DVD-R floating around.  What does
> the plus and minus signs indicate?

On the Sony DRU-510, DVD+R writes at 4X, and DVD-R at only 2X.  Other
than that, I'm not sure--ISTR reading that DVD-R may be a better choice
if you are making DVDs for video playback.

> 2) I've saved some old mailing list entries that indicate the Sony
> DRU500A comes "recommended" by the people answering the list.
> The one in the ad is a Sony DRU-510A.  From the model number, I'm
> concluding this is in the same drive family.  Has anybody had any
> experience with the DRU-510A?

I've used a couple (internal IDE), but only for data backup.  Ugly
drive, but works fine. 8-)

/usr/ports/sysutils/dvd+rw-tools is the port to install for data
recording.

-Warren Block * Rapid City, South Dakota USA