Tech ?'s : DVD burners

[bsfins]

Last week,I was doing a back up on my computer,Burning all the important stuff that I would hate to lose for ever,if a lose a hard drive.The burner started burning at like 1x,it was taking forever,all the sudden it said the disk was bad,it couldn't burn...Then it wouldn't recognize any disk I put in it.The Pisser is I just bought my first spool of DVD's,typically I just bought 5 at a time,it was the first disk in the spool.

After looking around online,then on ebay,I went around town to look to see what one would run locally.

Problem 1...I just bought 50 8X DVD's,all the burners I was looking at were 16X Dual Layer burners.
Did I really want to spend the extra cash,for a dual layer burner?I have probably 3 years worth of 8X DVDs.

Problem 2....Half of them had lightscribe built in.Again I have a stash of blank DVD's.

I bought a sony Dual Layer 16x Drive for $50,it was onsale locally at walmart.It was onsale for $80 across the street at staples W/ $20 mail in rebate.


So here are my questions....

1.) Does burning at a slower speed make a better quality disk?

2.) Does the Software matter in the quality of the disk?
(I have Both Nero,and Roxio...Nero when I burn a DVd if it's above 4 GB,screams It;'s going to overburn,all the info wont fit on the disk.So i only use Nero to burn Music CD's)

3.) Is lightscribe really worth the extra expense of the burner,and Higher priced disks?

4.) How about the dual layer disks,are they worth it?

4a.) Will my non Dual Layer DVD Player,(on my Computer,or home player)see all the info on a Dual Layer disk?

thanks for all the info in advance....

[GUATARICCAN]

I have a single DVD burner. And w/ my compression program and decrypter, you can cram DL DVDs onto a 4.7 GB.

[run_to_win]

One thing I learned is that cheaper DVDs, such as the brand "Good Quality", won't burn in my machine.  I've never had a problem with Memorex, TDK, Sony, etc.

Since no one else has answered I'll take my best guesses at answering your questions to see how I compare to the experts.

1. No

2. No

3. This is the first I've heard of Lightscribe.  What is it?  (Heck, I'm still not even sure what BlueTooth is from my earlier cell phone question!)

4. Since DVDs are so cheap I don't think so.

4a.

[GUATARICCAN]

I use Sony DVD-R and have yet to have a problem. Oh and as for your questions, haven't the foggiest. And R-T-W, I think lightscribe is this dvd where you can burn the movie label, or anything else probably, onto the disc itself.

[BeefStewert]

I've heard that lightscribe takes like 20 or 30 minutes, so most people don't even use it.  It's a pretty F-ing cool features for Discs that you want to have a professional look, though.

[cyan]

1 - no
2 - no
3 - yes, if you have the time to do them, lightscribe is cool as hell
4 - yes
4a - there's really no such thing as a single-layer or dual-layer player. all players will play DL discs because they just restart the laser at the inner edge after the first layer is read, and then proceed with reading the second layer...hence the layer transition pause. all your DVD players will read single and dual layer discs. (hell, if your player was single-layer only, it wouldn't actually play any movies you buy in stores, as 95% of them are dual-layer)

[bsfins]

Lightscribe says" it can do silk screen Quality" Labels.it's where you burn a CD,or DVd, then flip the the DVD over and burn a label.

I do believe it's just black...not color...all the ones I looked at were about $10-$20 higher for lightscribe capale drives.The disks also cost more.

I'd like to have the thing that allows you to use your printer to print the label directly onto DVD...I remember seeing on like Beyond tommorrow or some show like that.

P.S. I only use name brand disk....I think I'll pay an extra buck or so for a brand,rather than Brand-O burnable Disks.

on a side note...
oops for all you spelling guru's yes I do realize,I should have used Dual,instead of Duel...I was at work,and just wrote it as fast as I could.....I'll fix them...

thanks again for the info....

[cyan]

lightscribe doesn't burn in "color" or black and white per-se, it burns the actual rainbow-colored prism image on the actual disc surface, not on an ink-type surface. check out a commercial DVD release from miramax for example, most of theirs use labels that are not ink-based.
here is an example: