Anyone know of a deal on Dual Layer DVDR's?
 

These things are just a massive wallet drain at $8-$10 a pop. Does anyone know of any deals, bulk purchase or otherwise?

Meritline has a few in the $5-$7 range.

Supermediastore is about the same.

With the advent of Blu-ray and HD-DVD, I just don't see dual layer coming down in price a whole lot. I'll stick with my $0.30-$0.40 single-layer discs from BB. :)

They dropped at Best Buy at least. They're now $25 instead of $30.

Just got 100 (single layer) for $40 at Best Buy. They were Fuji....so well see how they work for me.

<i>Edited for those who are confused</i>

What does that have to do with dual-layers??

I don't see the relevance either Bill. Oh well...no harm, no foul.

Anyway, thanks for the info Chew but I think you are off target when it comes to the high def formats. Yes, they will come but they will be "pre-recorded only" for a good long time. The recordable version will roll out much, much slower. Remember how many years passed between DVD's and DVDR's?

I guess that it will be at least 3-4 years before we see a low cost, high capacity alternative roll out from HD DVD or Blue Ray. For the meantime, buy a big hard drive or use Dual Layer discs.

Russ

I based my observation on these two articles:

Dual Layer Standard may disappear soon

and

Philips Demonstrates its Blu-ray Disc PC drive capable of reading and writing on CD, DVD and Blu-ray Discs

The PC Blu-Ray writer is supposed to be released late 2005. The fact that a writer drive is actually coming out around the time the format is, doesn't give me a lot of hope that dual-layer will be much more than a "footnote". :)

I can't wait to see the price on a Blu-Ray-/+R ;)

I heard late 2005 as well for Blue Ray. How much do you want to bet that it will be late 2006 in reality and late 2007 before the media is less than $20 a disc?

I dunno, I just don't see them rolling the technology out in quantity until Americans are fully ready to embrace it and start replacing their DVD collections. After all, most of us only gave up on the VCR a year or two ago and the big chains like Blockbuster Video will fight tooth and nail for having to change it all over again.

No my friend, I believe this will be a niche item for the tech savy for a few more years I reckon. As for Dual discs, they are a royal pain because you can't assign the layer change but I guess they will have to do for a little while longer.

Russ

Yes, you can assign the layer change. Only on certain programs can you not.

but yeah...i believe that the blue-ray/HD recorders will take over. From what I heard, the internal drive that's supposed to come out at the end of this year is only going to be about $200.

Adobe Encore 2.5 can assign layer change according to Maximum PC for March 05 issue

Just responding to Chew....

and Craig, I think one question mark is necessary. :)

FYI, Sony is coming out with a home recorder this year that supports dual-layer burning. Actually, it will burn ANY type of disc. :)

Both Verbatim and Memorex (I believe) have larger packs available for the first time at my Best Buy today. I saw a 10 pack of the Verbatim for $60.

Memorex had a 3 pack for $20 and a 15 as well but can't remember how much that was. Nice to see that they're making it out there at this point. Still waiting for the price to drop though :(

I really do doubt we'll ever see a significant price break on DL. I think with the copyright issues involved, we just won't see it happen.

I think you will since eventually all burners are going to be dual-layers. The home dual-layer recorders will be coming out later this year and the PC ones have been out for quite some time. They're actively being promoted now whereas they weren't before and the fact that Best Buy is stocking more is a good sign...plus prices are dropping.

last week compusa had 25 packs of memorex (ritek) DL for $100 (might be back to $119 this week).

buy.com had 3 packs of memorex DL for $12 (sold out now) and has 3 packs of verbatim for $16 (the best DL discs by far). one coaster in my memorex 3 pack. none in the verbatim.

best buy had 15 packs of memorex DL for $70, i think.

i think the price issue with DL is more quality control than copyright issues. if copyright issues were the case, then why the huge drop in price of single layer blanks over the past year? as those of us who have had many a costly coaster can attest, it's not easy to make those DLs. would seem that the QC issue is really driving the pricing. as demand slowly increases and the manufacturing technology improves, i think there will be a decrease in price. we've seen it already. used to be $10 per disc as the standard, now we're down to $4-$5 in less than one year.

I've burned about 6 DL's and although that's not a lot, they burned perfectly and work perfectly. What were the problems people are having?

The 15 packs of memorex are $70. 10 packs of verbatim are $60. 3 packs of memorex are $20. 3 packs of Verbatim are $25. I think they had one other brand there as well (Ritek) but out of stock.

DL will come down in price.

If the movie industry is smart, they will sell the HD-DVDs so cheap, that most people (and stores) will buy those instead of regular DVDs. If this happens, it would totally stop pirating in its shoes. But if they are greedy, and sell the DVDs at high prices as well as the HD-DVD players, then they shot themselves in the foot.

I expect DL media to be affordable around the end of this year, and early next year (6-8 months from now). I would really like the DL media for backing up my hard drives and storing my own video.

I could see the end of this year as well. Once they are available in stand-alone recorders, people are going to want to utilize that technology and then the price will come down. Hell, like i said, I just saw a DL internal drive being promoted at Best Buy this week and was surprised. People are just slower to catch on with this.

And you thought pirating was bad before?? Oy vey. I can't imagine what's going to happen once these discs come down in price. I've already "backed up" a few Japanese discs that would've cost me $60 otherwise ;)

CompUSA had 25 packs of Memorex DL's for $79 today. Any other deals out there?

The Sam's club in Rosedale, MD had 3 Verbatim 3-packs bundled together for $47. Not a bad deal. I'm not sure if they still have them, but I will check.

Haven't heard good things about Memorex. I'll only use Verbatim and Ridata.

BestBuy has 15packs of Memorex DL for $30 after $30 instant rebate.

Just bought 15 from Circuit City for $40, so taking those back (right after I test one to see how Memorex performs).

You can read several not-so-glowing reviews here:
http://www.videohelp.com/dvdmedia.ph...=2869#comments

Thank you, Chew

Saved me some coin