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Ah, just the thread I’ve been looking for. Maybe someone will give me some help. Freepers know everything.

I just got two new computers. Both of them have one device, called a “DVD Drive”.

Now I installed some new programd using this drive...the usual way. I put the installation disk in the drive and the program installed.

So why is it called a “DVD drive”? I think of DVD’s as things that have movies on them. The front of the thing does say it’s a “multi-use” sort of thing.

I also have a camera/movie recorder and I want to apply for a TV show that will have me winning millions. The rules say that the film that I must make of myself should be “DVD formats”.

So....can I copy the AVI file from my C drive onto this “DVD drive”? Can I use regular CD-RW or CD-R disks in this thing? Does the fact that it’s called a DVD drive thus make my copy of the AVI file on it a “DVD format”?

I appreciate any help anyone can give me. I will share some of my millions with you if I get some good answers.

I am new to this but chugging along as I learn.

Heh.

They’re DVD drives because computers store their data on drives, drives of various formats and media. Harddrives, floppy drives, tape drives, thumb drives, CD drives and DVD drives.

In theory, unless you got one of the cheapest DVD drives in the history of ever, your DVD drive can access all the shiny disks, data CDs, data DVDs, music and video CDs, and music and video DVDs. Reading and (if it’s a writing drive) writing as appropriate.

As for file formatting nothing innate about the drive will change that, there are software tools that will let you turn an AVI into the DVD format which you could then burn onto a DVD and have a DVD movie. But if you chose not to use that software and burned that AVI onto the DVD you’d just have a data DVD with an AVI on it.

Don’t think of DVDs as just things that have movies on them. DVD stands for Digital Versatile Disc — not Digital Video Disc. It can store any kind of data.

Your “DVD drive” is probably actually a DVD writer. (Either that or it’s a DVD-ROM drive, which can only READ DVD discs but not CREATE them, since ROM stands for Read Only Memory. But I’m betting that you have a DVD Writer, since you say you just got these computers. DVD Writers are standard issue now.)

Anyway — Your DVD Writer can play DVD movie discs, sure. But it can also:

1. Read DVDs that have other data on them, like software programs that are packaged on DVD discs.

2. Write DVDs to DVD-R, DVD+R, DVD-RW or DVD+RW discs. (And sometimes, depending on the writer, to DVD-RAM format discs, although those are out of favor now.)

I usually stick with either DVD+R or DVD-R formats for blank DVD discs. What’s the difference between +R and -R? There are tech differences, but none that you really have to worry about. Each stores about 4.7 GB of data.

DVD+R and DVD-R format discs are “write-once” discs. That means that once you write (aka “burn”) information onto them, that’s it. It’s permanent. You can’t erase the information and write again.

The +RW and -RW discs, on the other hand, are ReWriteable discs. You can burn to them, then reformat and use them again. Again, there’s no practical difference between +RW and -RW formats, for most people.

There are also double-density (DL) DVD+R discs that are available. These store about twice as much data as regular DVD+R discs. Nearly all commercial movie DVDs are written on double-density DVD discs. Your DVD writer should be able to handle reading and writing these discs also.

3. In addition to reading and writing DVDs, your drive can also read and write CDs — both audio ones and data ones. You buy blank CD-R discs for that. They store about 700MB each.

In order to “copy” an AVI file to a DVD disc, you need to have a DVD authoring program. I use Adobe Premiere Elements or just Windows Movie Maker (limited but easy), to edit my videos, then Nero Vision to author to DVD. Authoring a DVD involves adding the video (AVI, MPG, etc.) files, creating the DVD’s main menu, and so on. I’m not entirely happy with the tools I have — I’m sure people can recommend some better ones out there — but mine work OK.

So, there’s a difference between just copying an AVI file to a DVD+R blank disc, and actually creating a movie DVD. I just explained the latter. If you simply did the former — just used a DVD burning program like Nero and burned the AVI file onto a DVD data disc — well, you’d have a nice backup of your AVI file, but that’s it. You wouldn’t be able to stick it into a DVD player and play it. You need to author a DVD video disc, as I mentioned, to accomplish that.

Hope this helps and didn’t confuse you further....