Dual Layer - Failied Technology?

[Thank The Cheese]

This topic came up in a conversation with a friend today and I've been looking forward to asking the geniuses here for an answer (no pressure or anything)...

The first DVD recorder I bought was for my PC many years ago. I remember thinking "hmm, should I buy this now, or should I wait until the dual layer burners come out." after all, there is nothing more annoying than buying a piece of technology only to have it superceeded weeks later. Besides, all the experts I knew were tipping DL would replace single layers within a couple of years, much like High Density floppy disks.

A few years have passed and that same DVD burner is sitting in my PC. In fact, my eMac is the only computer that has a DL burner, and I think I've used a dual layer disc twice in the 2 years I've had it. This is mainly because the cost of a DL disc is 4-5 times that of single layer discs, so there's just no point.

So what the hell happened? Does anyone here know why it didn't take off? No doubt the cost of the discs has a lot to do with it, but then why havem't they come down in price like all storage media.

There's no point companies pushing it now with Bluray/HD-DVD just around the corner. The only thing I can think of is the MPAA has stopped it so people couldn't copy full-quality movies.

Or maybe it has enjoyed more success overseas?

Cheers!

 

[fryke]

DL drives really came too late, I think. There was already talk about Blu-Ray and HD-DVD. And since "normal" DVD-R(W)s already give you 4.7 GB, people only consider buying DL-media for specific tasks. But if nobody really _buys_ the media, they're not falling in price like DVD-Rs did because of the mass-effect.

I expect DL-media to never really make it. Even if I _had_ a DL-drive, I'd still use DVD-R and DVD-RW, since I can get those cheaply. I don't feel compelled to upgrade my external FW-DVD-RW until I can buy a HD-DVD or Blu-Ray (combined would be best, I guess) drive inexpensively to put in that drive-housing.

 

[Mikuro]

I think the technology hasn't taken off because it's expensive and slow and the extra space isn't all that useful, so there's very little demand.

I think that DVDs and CDs are used more for backups than anything else. When it comes to backups, all you want is a good combination of convenience and affordability, and you just can't beat single-layer DVDs there. They're cheaper than CDs MB-for-MB these days, and more convenient, too. Double-layer DVDs are barely useful at all in this sense, because who really needs more than 4.3GB per disc to make backups??? The slight extra convenience of the increased capacity just doesn't come close to outweighing A) the price, and B) the extra time it takes to burn (most if not all drives write SL media MUCH faster than DL media).

For a while, CDs seemed enormous. It was hard to imagine them ever becoming obsolete. That time has passed, but now DVDs feel the same way. Hardly anyone needs more space right now. In a few years, when everyone's making HD iMovies (yeah, right), maybe. But not now.

I can't imagine why I'd need DL DVDs. Well, unless I were duplicating commercial DVDs...

Basically, it's a solution in search of a problem.

 

[Thank The Cheese]

insightful as always fellas

thanks for that, it makes a lot of sense.

 

[fryke]

Well... my home folder is a little over 50 GB right now. _I'd_ like a DVD like medium that takes all of it in one run for backups. I don't really do backups on DVDs, since that'd take a LOT of time that I don't have (I'd have to _actively_ be there to switch DVD-Rs about ten to twelve times!), so I'm doing backups on FW harddrives.

But a 50 GB medium is probably just as far away as my 120 GB home folder.