pioneer A04

sonicboom wrote on 9/6/2002, 1:40 PM

i just went to a website i like to buy stuff from -- octave.com --- and they are selling the pioneer a04 for $319
i think i am going to buy it!!
the dvd authoring program which comes with it is mydvd
i see some people in here use ulead
i was wondering if i can get some feedback on this
btw, the a04 is dvd-r...i think this plays on all new dvd's
the price is now like $1.59 per dvd-r ---- 2 hours worth of data
thnx in advance for your input
sb

Comments

John_Cline wrote on 9/6/2002, 2:28 PM

www.accessmicro.com has them for $285 + $8.75 shipping. I'm sure they can be found even cheaper than this. I have one and it works great.

John

sonicboom wrote on 9/6/2002, 3:31 PM

but what authoring program do you use?
i never used one before?
mydvd comes with the a04
others seem to like uleads
i wondering the pros and cons of each
thnx
sb

TLT wrote on 9/6/2002, 3:43 PM

I have the Pioneer 104, it works great! Go to http://www.meritline.com you can get the 104 OEM version (same drive as the A04) for around $265.00 Blank media for $1.19 per disk all have worked fine for me. Have to buy 25. I use Dazzle's DVD complete to author the DVD-r disks. Also very nice software. $99.00 http://www.dazzle.com

RCW wrote on 9/6/2002, 10:27 PM

I also have the Pioneer DVR-104. I have done my editing and rendering to DVD NTSC using VV3. Then I load the MPG-2 file (or files) into Ulead DVD MovieFactory to generate the menus and burn the DVD with MovieFactory. The resulting DVD's work great in both the computer and in set top players. The picture quality on a high end TV is very good. Much better than SVCD. I've also burned DVD's using Nero with the DVR-104. I got mine from www.ESbuy.com for $246.44 with free shipping.

Erk wrote on 9/8/2002, 9:59 PM

Just got the A04 yesterday! Burned one DVD thus far, which played great in my set top and computer DVD drive.

My only regret is that I wish I had bought the OEM version, without the Sonic MyDVD software, and saved some $$. As soon as I discovered that it will not let you set any chapter/scenes (unless they were set during recording the MPEG), I went out and bought Ulead's Movie Factory for $50. Moviefactory is pretty easy to use and customize. I'd heard good things about Dazzle as well, but also many negative comments on Cnet (mostly stability problems). As they say, your mileage may vary.

G

stepfour wrote on 9/9/2002, 12:59 AM

I saw the Cnet info. Dazzle has a link to it on their site. Very strange. It says Editiors Choice but then you dig deeper and find all these disgruntled users posting bad things about the software.

I have used DVD Complete for several months, and it has been excellent. I noticed a lot of those unhappy users got DVD Complete as part of some hardware package from Dazzle and found that some sort of capture didn't work right. I have never tried to capture with it but supposedly it can. Anyway, as a DVD authoring tool, I am very happy with it and don't hesitate to recommend it.

TLT wrote on 9/9/2002, 12:11 PM

I used to take advise from CNET. Now I go to forums and read what the users say. CNET doesn't even rate Vegas 3.0 Need I say more.

grue wrote on 9/9/2002, 11:20 PM

I have the 104 and so far have no complaints. The MyDVD software just doesn't seem to work well for me.

I tried the Dazzle DVD Complete demo, but ran up against some issues. E-mailed support, but never heard anything from them. Needless to say, I won't be buying that one :)

I now use MovieFactory and it works fairly well. The chapters are relatively easy to setup.

Still looking for something better though.

Tom