second-generation DVD-R: successful launch or sophomore slump? - Hardware Review - Evaluation

Emedia Professional, Dec, 1999 by Lauren Wiley

Pioneer's second-generation DVD-Recorder has two things going for it: lower price and higher capacity.

The DVR-S201 dropped the price of a DVD-R drive from $17,000 to $5,400 and its maximum capacity increased from 3.95GB to 4.7GB, with media available at either capacity retailing for as low as $33.

But industry professionals say a serious problem stands in the way of the recorder moving beyond its primary role as a pre-production way to test DVD videos. That roadblock is a lack of compatibility with DVD players.

Mark Johnson, Daikin's technology manager for product design and technical support, described a telling scene at Online Inc.'s August 1999 DVD PRO conference.

Knowing the compatibility problems with DVD-R and DVD players, Johnson opted to create a presentation for his session with PowerPoint, but other professionals went with DVD-R. Before the session began, the presenters discovered the player wouldn't read their media. An audience member offered his player, which he said always read his DVD-R discs. That one didn't work either.

Johnson also has heard of players that work with first-generation DVD-R media, but not second, and vice versa.

"There are few, if any, manufacturers who officially support DVD-R on their set-top players," Johnson says. "That's been a real shame."

Although it's a lot cheaper to burn the media with a recorder rather than ordering a full pressing, Johnson says, no one is ever going to do large runs with DVD-Recorders until the issue is resolved.

"They need to be able to stick (the DVD-R discs)in a player and make it work," he says. "You've got businesses there that want to go to DVD, but if you can't count on the medium, that really dampens the chance of the business developing. You've got to have compatibility, and you've got to have reliability."

Staffers at InnovaCom, which offers a DVD authoring solution, DVDimpact, that bundles the DVR-S201, have to trek over to electronic stores to figure out which DVD players will work with different types of DVD-R media, says Janek Kaliczak, vice president of marketing and business development. "There's confusion," he says.

Although DVD-R promises a way to do low-cost, limited-run production, he says, DVD-RAM is gaining ground with increased capacity and rapidly dropping prices. That's why InnovaCom offers DVD-RAM as an option in its DVD authoring system.

Blaine Graboyes, Zuma Digital's chief operating officer and creative director, says his company will not send 4.7GB DVD-R discs out of the studio because of the compatibility issue. Still, his company uses a tremendous amount of 4.7GB media for testing internally, rather than relying on computer-based emulation tools. "Previously, we had been required to post gap a 3.95GB disc to fit a full DVD image," he said.

Zuma differs from most companies, Graboyes says, in that almost 60 percent of its projects finish on DVD-R. "Entertainment projects use DVD-R for evaluation and testing, but most of our other projects (for presentations and museums) actually finish on DVD-R," he says.

Zuma had one of the first 3.95GB burners in September 1997 as well as one of the first new burners this year. The company uses about 100 TDK DVD-R discs a month, 70 percent of which are 3.95GB. Until issues such as compatibility are resolved, Zuma cannot switch over completely to 4.7GB, Graboyes says.

Like many others, Graboyes has no idea when other drive manufacturers will jump into the DVD-R market, but he believes competition will soon heat up. There have been some advances beyond Pioneer's second-generation DVD-Recorder, he says, giving high praise to the new duplicators from MicroBoards. "They have an $8,000 unit with one burner, and for $12,000, you can slave two more," he says. "That means three dupes in the time of one. Very cool for us as we often have projects that require 20 to 30 DVD-R discs."

MicroBoards Technology's vice president of sales and new business development, Chuck Alcon, Jr., has similar praise for Pioneer's DVR-S201. "I'm extremely happy with it, "he says. "It's a very solid device." When the recorder debuted, he says, "there was a very significant pent-up demand and there was back log for six months," but since then the company has been shipping in a timely manner.

As for other companies competing against Pioneer, Alcon maintains that other manufacturers won't start selling DVD recorders until rewritable formats become more viable and the 2.0 specifications are finalized.

When DVD-Audio finally premieres, it will change the way recordable DVD is used, he says, which is now 90 percent for videos by Hollywood studios and by mid-range users who create corporate or government educational products and presentations, with the remaining being utilized for mass storage.

Alcon predicts another company will enter the market in the second quarter of next year and that recordable DVD will become a mainstream, consumer product within 2-1/2 years--less than half the time it took CD-R.

Alcon stresses that DVD-R is not being created or positioned to replace CD-R. "CD-R will continue to grow in its applications and popularity," he says.