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I've been a big fan of Sony's DVD+R and DVD-R media for years and use it for a lot of my personal stuff. I picked up a spindle of their DVD+R discs at Best Buy today and was surprised that the MID was RITEK F16.

Sigh.. It's getting harder and harder to get good recordable media. Everyone seems to be using Ritek or CMC and the quality varies so much from spindle to spindle that its a crap shoot. I guess I'll have to try to hunt down some SONY D21 discs before they're all gone.

Here's why:

http://www.digitimes.com/news/a20100125PD203.html

Ritek, on January 22, announced that it has signed an MOU with fellow Taiwan-based Daxon to purchase the latter's optical disc manufacturing equipment at a total price of up to NT$500 million (US$15.6 million).

For those that weren't aware... Daxon made Sony's discs for them

The D21's I used worked very well depending on the drive that burned them, usually you had to make sure the spindle was made in Japan to get them.
I haven't seen any MIJ spindles of Sony for a long time and I check that when I'm buying media to try and get better quality blanks.
The rumor is that some of the Frys stores got some in but they are too far away from me just to drive over and look when they are on sale there.
I agree it's getting to the point you have to buy online just to find good quality disks anymore what with Verbatim selling the crap Life series now in most shops

The last D21's I bought were from Target. I might have to try there again. Any idea how to tell the packaging apart?

Not for sure but it should say made in Japan in the fine print. I haven't had any of that media for probably a year now and I thought it was all gone so haven't been checking much lately.
I did buy up as much of the falcon made UAE Verbatim Azo stuff as I could stand at Office Max so I'm good on blanks for a while but if any shows up I'd probably buy some again. Would be nice to find something that can actually go 24x in the Optiarc drives sometime.
There used to be threads on what hub codes and packaging were what on CD Freaks but I don't know if they are up to date anymore as media is such a crap shoot anymore...and mostly crap...

Results are hit and miss. First is with a Lite-On iHBS112 and the second with Optiarc AD-7260S.

Well here's hoping you/we find some more of the good Sony D21 mid stuff somewhere. I used that mid before too and I think my results are pretty similar to what your getting.
They probably burn better at 12x or something like most so so stuff.

The last batch of D21 I got wasn't that great either. It was better than these though.

One of the reasons I burn less media than ever today. Such a challenge to find it and the quality is so hit/miss (more miss). Was more expensive from Rima.com, but you knew what you were getting. My movies are going to matroska files these days. I have a LG BD390 in the bedroom, a Samsung ION Netbook with HDMI that can go where ever, and a WDTV Live in the living room. I do more hard drive based backups today than ever and have online storage for backing up photos and some files. I just don't feel record-able media is a good long term storage solution. I do use it on occasion for short term and for some portable needs. I burn more music to CD-R and glad I stocked up on the old Maxell CDR-Pro discs when the Walmart's in my area clearanced them out for cheap.

SithTracy wrote:One of the reasons I burn less media than ever today. Such a challenge to find it and the quality is so hit/miss (more miss). Was more expensive from Rima.com, but you knew what you were getting. My movies are going to matroska files these days. I have a LG BD390 in the bedroom, a Samsung ION Netbook with HDMI that can go where ever, and a WDTV Live in the living room. I do more hard drive based backups today than ever and have online storage for backing up photos and some files. I just don't feel record-able media is a good long term storage solution. I do use it on occasion for short term and for some portable needs. I burn more music to CD-R and glad I stocked up on the old Maxell CDR-Pro discs when the Walmart's in my area clearanced them out for cheap.

I have to say that I agree with you 100%. Although I need to replace my CD/DVD drives, it isn't because it isn't performing well (it's literally just not performing). Honestly, I only burn DVD's so I can send off my demo reel to different companies. With the quality of disk spindles being questionable, you're better off storing your media on an external hard drive or online storage (like you basically mentioned).

I haven't been burning very many DVDs lately either, but I never tried the Sony. What's this Life series to stay away from by Verbatim? Also, what's the good Verbatim DVDs to order from Rima? Sorry to get OT a bit.

The new life series from Verbatim is CMC made and is junk compared to their Azo line stuff they used to sell. I was trying to get as many of the UAE made spindles as I could before Office Max ran out and ended up with 4 UAE and one Taiwan made batch, that should hold me for a LONG time at the rate I've been burning DVD's lately. I don't know if they are going to still sell Azo line disks at a premium but it's pretty apparent they decided to join all the other bottom feeders and sell low grade disks that they can sell for even more profit per box, rather then sell good quality stuff and make a smaller profit per box. Anyways try to verify you at least get Azo series disks, and if possible UAE made ones at that.

These look like the DVD-Rs I usually get (looks like most if not all are AZO as well) but I don't think I have ever bought the branded ones:
http://www.rima.com/prod/1792.html
http://www.rima.com/prod/1869.html
http://www.rima.com/prod/95203.html
http://www.rima.com/prod/95101.html
http://www.rima.com/prod/97017.html

...and I think the max I usually buy is 50, so that narrows it down a bit. I'll chime in later with the DVD+R DL ones.