Moving into Blue Ray

[Jasper]

OK, have been using DVD FAB for some months now, and despite a few initial problems caused by my ignorance, I have found it absoluely perfect, no problems at all and easy to use for what I need. Since moving on to Verbatim 16 x DVD-r disks as recommended by helpful people, I am now considering purchasing a Blue Ray writer and moving into that territory! So, once again, pleading ignorance and asking for some basic advice! two things to start with, a/ recommendation of best external burner to buy (in the UK) b/ best disks to use.
What I would ideally like to do is as simple as I now do with standard DVD, i.e. put the disk in, start the program and select main movie only, burn using Image burn, (never failed me to date) and get a good copy out the other end.
If this is too simplistic, any advice appreciated! Thanks in advance.

[DiabloZoe]

OK, have been using DVD FAB for some months now, and despite a few initial problems caused by my ignorance, I have found it absoluely perfect, no problems at all and easy to use for what I need. Since moving on to Verbatim 16 x DVD-r disks as recommended by helpful people, I am now considering purchasing a Blue Ray writer and moving into that territory! So, once again, pleading ignorance and asking for some basic advice! two things to start with, a/ recommendation of best external burner to buy (in the UK) b/ best disks to use.
What I would ideally like to do is as simple as I now do with standard DVD, i.e. put the disk in, start the program and select main movie only, burn using Image burn, (never failed me to date) and get a good copy out the other end.
If this is too simplistic, any advice appreciated! Thanks in advance.

LG makes a good external drive and it can burn protected disc! I use TDK BD disc and I never have any problems with them!

[Jasper]

Thanks

OK, thats a start! any idea of a model number? and best place to buy the disks, (you can PM me if it risks any rules being broken) 55 in a few hours, looking for a birthday present! lol, eldest son has just brought a selection of Blu Ray disks and his player round, and have to say, WELL sold on the idea!

[DiabloZoe]

OK, thats a start! any idea of a model number? and best place to buy the disks, (you can PM me if it risks any rules being broken) 55 in a few hours, looking for a birthday present! lol, eldest son has just brought a selection of Blu Ray disks and his player round, and have to say, WELL sold on the idea!

It kinda depends on a few things but mainly what your system can handle!! If you have the option for an internal writer you will be better off! Just go to LG's website and look at there optical drives. And the best place I have found is eBay! But other members can steer you into finding great deals on disc's! See I only buy BDRE for a few reasons 1 if you have a miss burn you did not make a coaster and can re write the disc. I also don't collect movies anymore I have over a 1000 and they are just collecting dust so when I backup a movie and in a few months they are playing it on TV I can just burn over the movie and put another on there. I also buy 50GB so I don't have to compress a movie the copy process is allot shorter and well no compression! Feel free to ask any questions you have and I will try and get you on the right track!

[amdowney]

I just bought a bargain internal LG rewriter for £70 on Amazon!

Re-writable 50Gb discs however are at least £14 each!!!

[Jasper]

getting there

Thanks for that, I have a laptop, so needs to be external, looking at this one:-
BE12LU30.........
If it is going to be a lot more complicated than what I do now, for backing up my DVD`s then probably will not bother, at the moment I use the laptops internal writer, as the external one I had gave up the ghost. I simply pop in the dvd, select main movie, when it asks for a blank disk I remove the original and pop in a blank, shortly afterwards it is done! This is what I was kind of hoping for with Blu Ray, or am I expecting too much

[DiabloZoe]

Thanks for that, I have a laptop, so needs to be external, looking at this one:-
BE12LU30.........
If it is going to be a lot more complicated than what I do now, for backing up my DVD`s then probably will not bother, at the moment I use the laptops internal writer, as the external one I had gave up the ghost. I simply pop in the dvd, select main movie, when it asks for a blank disk I remove the original and pop in a blank, shortly afterwards it is done! This is what I was kind of hoping for with Blu Ray, or am I expecting too much

No its not more complicated but more steps for the reason of saving your burner! They do wear out as you DVD burner will to.

[Jasper]

No its not more complicated but more steps for the reason of saving your burner! They do wear out as you DVD burner will to.

OK, just ordered a stand alone Blu Ray player, so next step is the writer, probably go for the one I mentioned in a week or so, BUT also just realised that I will also need a larger hard drive as the Blu Ray images are large! So cost is going up. Considering a 2tb external connected to my laptop via USB, and mapped on the network, like that I assume I can use that as the temp drive for the burner? Any problems with that?

[DiabloZoe]

OK, just ordered a stand alone Blu Ray player, so next step is the writer, probably go for the one I mentioned in a week or so, BUT also just realised that I will also need a larger hard drive as the Blu Ray images are large! So cost is going up. Considering a 2tb external connected to my laptop via USB, and mapped on the network, like that I assume I can use that as the temp drive for the burner? Any problems with that?

Should not be a problem if you have access to both drives at the same time! The most space you will use on the HDD is 45.1 plus what ever you compress down to, then you can erase both files! But the 2TB will be fine just so long as you can bring both up in explorer at the same time!

[rabbitaoy]

LG makes a good external drive and it can burn protected disc! I use TDK BD disc and I never have any problems with them!

Hi Diablo,

Can you explain more in detail what you mean by "burn protected disc"?

[DiabloZoe]

Hi Diablo,

Can you explain more in detail what you mean by "burn protected disc"?

I don't know which burners can and can't except for LG but a protected disc is at the moment for playing on players infected with cinavia! And the biggest culprit is the PS3, take a look at the cinavia thread at the top

[Jasper]

Arrived

Should not be a problem if you have access to both drives at the same time! The most space you will use on the HDD is 45.1 plus what ever you compress down to, then you can erase both files! But the 2TB will be fine just so long as you can bring both up in explorer at the same time!

OK, story so far, my new Blu Ray player, (an LG one) arrived today, so went out and purchased a Blu Ray to try it on. Have to say well impressed, it has a network connection on the rear, (no wired network so wondering if a "Wireless Stick) would work in it, but it has an RJ45 network port, so have to investigate that one! Picture quality is realy good, (at least to my eyes) on my matching LG 50" Plasma! Set the thing up and played a bit of the Blu Ray, well happy with that, but then what REALLY surprised me was I played a Back up disk written using DVD Fab, and it up scaled it to almost as good as the original Blue Ray!!!!! So, wondering if I need a Blu Ray writer at all now, lol.
Also handy is a USB port on the front, and sticking a USB drive full of pictures in it I was amazed at the display quality, (all pictures taken by my Daughters Canon Eos! Next step I think is going to be the external drive, followed by the writer when I have funds!