Safest place to buy media ?

[ricksimm]

How do you know that you are getting the media product that you want? Should you stay away from unbranded media? Which on-line media sellers can be trusted?

[kotrtim]

Unbranded disc might be good, might be bad
Most of the unbranded are "CMC Magnetics".

They are the few brands that always use ONLY good manufacturer's disc
That's
Plextor
Verbatim DataLifePlus (Azo)
Mitsubishi (Azo)
Yamaha

[burninfool]

I trust www.allmediaoutlet.com , www.rima.com and www.newegg.com .

[TheWizard]

I agree with burninfool and kotrtim, except on one point. Most unbranded discs are not necessarily made by CMC. There is a fair share of unbranded discs made by a variety of manufacturers. Basically, buying unbranded media is a crapshoot. It may be entirely possible that kotrtim has been lucky (or unlucky, depending how you look at it) to receive mostly unbranded CMC discs. In my experience, I have received unbranded discs from Ritek, Prodisc, Sony, Postech, and CMC. Out of those four, I received more Ritek unbranded discs than any other. Does that mean most unbranded discs are Ritek? No, it's just my personal experience.

To answer your questions, ricksimm, you can't be sure that you are going to get the media product you want. If you want Sony discs, for example, then buy Sony discs. If you are willing to take a risk and don't care which manufactured discs you receive, then buy unbranded ones. I've bought unbranded discs before, and I'd buy them again, if the price is right. I don't mind, it gives me more samples to test media compatibility with.

I have tried and liked the following online stores:

www.allmediaoutlet.com
www.rima.com
www.newegg.com
www.qtccdr.com
www.cdrplanet.com
www.shop4tech.com
www.ily.com