On DVDs, coasters and Players

Well, it turns out that I can burn good discs after all, but the players I have, excluding the Panasonioc portable, cannot play DVD -R discs.

Today I went to Best Buy to look over what was on the market that would play the various formats.

The space I have is limited, as is my budget, so I ended up replacing my little used VCR with a combo unit from Samsung - the DVD-V4600. It'll handle all the formats I use or intend to use. (Surprisingly, not MP3 though) They had an open box unit for just over $100. If I want to, I can now also pack away my CD changer and the Toshiba DVD player too. It's not region free though, so I can't watch JBadger's Japanese discs. ...

Another DVD only unit that caught my eye was a small unit, a CyberHome Model CH-DVD300S.
It's another that will handle all formats and it's in a compact 9" square 2 1/2" deep sturdy metal case.
It's also $35 after a rebate. Thirty Five Dollars! I find it amazing that the units have dropped to almost give away price.

Here's a review: http://www.doctorsgadgets.com/product.php/B0000A0AJH

Hmm, according to the review, you can also switch the region with a few button pushes. I may look into this one anyway ... see www.regionfreedvd.net for info.

OOps! A problem with older CD Rs

My dad does volunteer work in the AV department at the local hospital.
When he was last in the department head was trying to get some data off of some five year old CDRs they had burned for the archive.

It seems that the permanant marker that they had labelled the discs with has damaged the CDs and made them unreadable.

This could potentally be a major problem for all of us who mark our CDs in this manner.

ZZZZZzzz....

*YAWN*

I've been up since 4AM, it's now 4PM.

I'm at work with NOTHING to do. I'm not the only one.
The SysOp took the CAD Server off line at Noon and he cannot get it back online.

I feel sorry for the folks with upcoming deadlines.

Meanwhile ZZZZzzz...