DVD Resale value question?

[SeattleEd]

Hate to burst your bubble on this but that is not exactly true. It is true if you use crap garbage media and not bother to hunt down actual good brands while checking media codes (ex taiyo yuden are an excellent media to use). If you are already experiencing data loss, then it makes me want to ask you that it might be the way or where you have them stored as well as what media brand you were using. A lot of factors can play into shelf life, but to say they will all crap out in due time is just not true at all

Yes, it's all dependent on those factors. Not all medias are the same as well as burners and software. Let alone standalone units as well.
I should not have made a blanket statement as such that ALL will deteriorate in time. The fact of the matter is that the technology is fairly new and claims of a 100 year shelf life are over indulgent considering it hasn't even hit the quarter of century mark.
I can't speak for anyone but my own experience and from what I've seen and read from other endusers, yes, the media, including Taiyos, will expire. Either from adverse climate issues or daily use issues. Older media, including Tayios, have come a long way for optical media storage technology but this format is slowly giving way to more reliable formats such as drives, including flash based and solid state.
From years of working with Optical Media, I've learned to back it all up and remove from discs. In some cases I've learned the hard way where I've lost a lot of rare content. Yes, they were high end Taiyos Silver Pros and EMTEC Ceramics under temperature control. But then the average user doesn't take that into consideration so the average user WILL experience problems. Also constant use will degrade the dye overtime and cause loss in some areas of the layers or pivots.

This is also not exactly true either. Depending on your source and WHAT methods were used to convert whatever material to disc may not be noticeable at all. In some cases and depending on what is done with filtering you can actually get a cleaner better pic than what you started with (hell even the infamous jvc-drm100s dvd recorder deck has wonderful filters on input and cleans up a vhs pic very nicely, giving you a better pic than what you ran in). However if we are talking about actual film and since film has no resolution of course it may never look as super clean or good as the source, but that goes for bluray as well

So a 32GB source master will fit a 8GB SL DVD-R or 16GB DL DVD-R while retaining the same quality?
When you burn to disc all source is down sampled and compressed, in most cases the video is encoded to mp4 while the audio goes from your original source down to 16/44.1.
And of course with compression, you are squeezing content smaller while the algorithm in the codec tries to replicates previous frames when it fact, it's not all there. Quality drop.
DVD, IMO, is limited and there is quality drop.
A good example I've stated is The Twilight Zone on Blu-Ray. I've compared the sample HD file they sent us to my DVD SD version. Yes, there was noticeable different. More fluid and less choppiness.


EDIT

I hope I'm not coming off as arrogant or a Mr. Know-It-All since I don't mean to in any way. I'm an audiophile and videophile so quality has ALWAYS been important to me since I could remember. Yes, I'm picky and it drives my girlfriend nuts when I point things out while at a concert or seeing a movie.
I just want people to be informed or at least alert as to not to put all your eggs in one basket because it will come back to bite you in the end. Backup is a keyword and if you care about your digital contents then I recommend this word should be a mainstay in your vocabulary.

Not back to subject.

DVDs are going to be like 8mm, BETA, VHS and LASERDISCS and VCD, in my opinion.

[mazinz]

Yes, it's all dependent on those factors. Not all medias are the same as well as burners and software. Let alone standalone units as well.
I should not have made a blanket statement as such that ALL will deteriorate in time. The fact of the matter is that the technology is fairly new and claims of a 100 year shelf life are over indulgent considering it hasn't even hit the quarter of century mark.
I can't speak for anyone but my own experience and from what I've seen and read from other endusers, yes, the media, including Taiyos, will expire. Either from adverse climate issues or daily use issues. Older media, including Tayios, have come a long way for optical media storage technology but this format is slowly giving way to more reliable formats such as drives, including flash based and solid state.
From years of working with Optical Media, I've learned to back it all up and remove from discs. In some cases I've learned the hard way where I've lost a lot of rare content. Yes, they were high end Taiyos Silver Pros and EMTEC Ceramics under temperature control. But then the average user doesn't take that into consideration so the average user WILL experience problems. Also constant use will degrade the dye overtime and cause loss in some areas of the layers or pivots.






So a 32GB source master will fit a 8GB SL DVD-R or 16GB DL DVD-R while retaining the same quality?
When you burn to disc all source is down sampled and compressed, in most cases the video is encoded to mp4 while the audio goes from your original source down to 16/44.1.
And of course with compression, you are squeezing content smaller while the algorithm in the codec tries to replicates previous frames when it fact, it's not all there. Quality drop.
DVD, IMO, is limited and there is quality drop.
A good example I've stated is The Twilight Zone on Blu-Ray. I've compared the sample HD file they sent us to my DVD SD version. Yes, there was noticeable different. More fluid and less choppiness.


EDIT

I hope I'm not coming off as arrogant or a Mr. Know-It-All since I don't mean to in any way. I'm an audiophile and videophile so quality has ALWAYS been important to me since I could remember. Yes, I'm picky and it drives my girlfriend nuts when I point things out while at a concert or seeing a movie.
I just want people to be informed or at least alert as to not to put all your eggs in one basket because it will come back to bite you in the end. Backup is a keyword and if you care about your digital contents then I recommend this word should be a mainstay in your vocabulary.

Not back to subject.

DVDs are going to be like 8mm, BETA, VHS and LASERDISCS and VCD, in my opinion.

You are not coming off as arrogrant at all, but what I was getting at, all factors depending, optical media can or will more than likely last (if not longer) than our general life time. Even if problems do occur 20 years down the road, who knows at that point what we will be really using (and of course re-copying that material to whatever). That is what I was trying to say, it should last way past the 20 plus year point at the very least (good media, not like memorex or "bob's dvds").

Even the infamous video tape which was only supposed to last 13-15 years, I have some going on 30 years old that still play fine (betamax), as others who have older reel to reel video still working. Sure they may do accelerated aging in labs to come with their conclusions, but also keeping your media in a colder, dark (always keep them out of direct sunlight) place will help them last longer and prevent the chemical in the dye from changing


The second part with source material. You did not specify what type of source material we were talking about. I was under the assumption you were talking about actual film, not blu-ray transcoded down to whatever (if I do such a thing it goes to mpeg2 not mp4). Sure in that scenario you will loose something but encoding method used (or codec) will either make that almost unnoticeable or very noticeable. Also using a variable pass helps reduce things as well. The fact is that bluray does have a minor advantage and you can see things a bit more clearly, but it is not such an overly compelling picture that it would make me want to run out and re-purchase my collection, when a dvd with upscale comes close to the blu ray. Most people really do not see the difference anyway (divx quality isfine for the masses, sad but true)) and just go with that they are told

I do disagree in that hard drive storage will last more longer than optical media ever would. Too unsafe, but the masses are going for streaming nowadays and yes though I never see it getting wiped out, optical media will be second to hard drive/fash stroage. Damn kids

I can also bee blu-ray going the route of laserdisc for the reasons mentioned above

[SeattleEd]

IMO, all theoretical at this point with burnable optical media and as I've stated, I lost a lot of content for which I should have backed up on hard drive.


Tape will last but not completely. Our library houses 3/4", beta, digibeta and 1" reels of video. Climate controlled and stored in the dark warehouse. On some tapes we've experienced loss which ended up being tossed after being sent out to bake. Why? Could have been bad to begin with or lack of usage? We don't know but it's the nature of the beast.
Studios back up their masters over and over.


In regards to encoding, or burning, quality is lost when compressed to FIT a disc for playback on a device, in my eyes. mp2 is too large and takes up space. Most common is mp4 to fit more onto a disc. Not a fan of mp4.
If the source is film captured to high res, yes, you will need a bigger playback medium to fit the information of the file. I know I've noticed the difference between DVD and Blu-ray mastered discs. Will I go out and buy the upgrade, if I feel compelled but I don't own a Blu-ray player and have yet to find a reason why. I'd rather rip the disc and play back from a server on my LAN. If it's something I don't care about then popping in a DVD or playing a ProRes encoded file works for me. Or stream online at hi-res.

For the consumer well, they will take what is given to them apparently until they are told what to look for. Some may care and others don't. LOL
I pass on divx, terrible codec albeit being free.
Hard drives will not last longer than optical media or vice versa IMO. Best way is tape back up. Safest way for the moment is online lockers where all storage is backed up to tape. Akamai and Limelight do this for their content. But then why do that? LOL
No media is full proof. For storage, I've been going with hard drives and in a couple years I'll buy a new one to back up the old. It hurts the landfills but I do wish to keep my content until it becomes nil.


I like this discussion. Thank you!

[SeattleEd]

Mike,

Have you tried craigslist?

[mazinz]

IMO, all theoretical at this point with burnable optical media and as I've stated, I lost a lot of content for which I should have backed up on hard drive.


Tape will last but not completely. Our library houses 3/4", beta, digibeta and 1" reels of video. Climate controlled and stored in the dark warehouse. On some tapes we've experienced loss which ended up being tossed after being sent out to bake. Why? Could have been bad to begin with or lack of usage? We don't know but it's the nature of the beast.
Studios back up their masters over and over.


In regards to encoding, or burning, quality is lost when compressed to FIT a disc for playback on a device, in my eyes. mp2 is too large and takes up space. Most common is mp4 to fit more onto a disc. Not a fan of mp4.
If the source is film captured to high res, yes, you will need a bigger playback medium to fit the information of the file. I know I've noticed the difference between DVD and Blu-ray mastered discs. Will I go out and buy the upgrade, if I feel compelled but I don't own a Blu-ray player and have yet to find a reason why. I'd rather rip the disc and play back from a server on my LAN. If it's something I don't care about then popping in a DVD or playing a ProRes encoded file works for me. Or stream online at hi-res.

For the consumer well, they will take what is given to them apparently until they are told what to look for. Some may care and others don't. LOL
I pass on divx, terrible codec albeit being free.
Hard drives will not last longer than optical media or vice versa IMO. Best way is tape back up. Safest way for the moment is online lockers where all storage is backed up to tape. Akamai and Limelight do this for their content. But then why do that? LOL
No media is full proof. For storage, I've been going with hard drives and in a couple years I'll buy a new one to back up the old. It hurts the landfills but I do wish to keep my content until it becomes nil.


I like this discussion. Thank you!

I do not like mp4 either or the fact of transcoding it down to watch on a 2" stupid Ipod screen (although the biggest trend now being the AVCHD format usually with the h264 codec). In my eyes if I am watching a film I want to watch it on some sort of television. However in the codec world if quality is the not the biggest concern, right now mp4 is the method of choice and slowly replacing divx. Those digital copies that come with a bluray for your portable device are a joke too, the main reason why-- because the studios have the nerve to give the file (drm related) an expiration date!! It would make more sense to just rip the blueray and trascode if that is your thing

Actually the biggest draw for the bluray survival was it's addition in a playstation 3. Had that not occured it would be doing worse than it already is despite the push for it in that direction. As mentioned, bluray's death is imminent due lower sales, dvd's still much stronger foothold on the world and due to the streaming media which will eventually kill (never fully) most of everything else in the optical world

I can never trust tape of any type anymore, Though I know what kind of tape you are talking about for master copies the studios use, it can still "get damaged" so to speak.

I have had the opposite occur in that media has been fine (even for the 10 year old dvd-r burns and (for the record) the 15 plus year old cds before that), but hard drives (seagate barracuda, etc) are too unpredictable working fine one night and then with no warning die out the next.

Nothing last forever, but I am still going to stick with the optical world