The new glossy inkjet-printable disks

riredale wrote on 10/25/2006, 12:05 PM
Just got my sample kit from Diskmakers featuring the new "Ultra Hydroshield" printable CD-Rs. Wow! The surface looks like glass, and the inkjet-printed colors are vibrant and saturated. I also held the disk under the water tap for a few seconds and tried to rub off any of the color. No change.

In the past, I've used Meritline gloss labels for all my CD and DVD work. If applied properly, the gloss labels look great and have no effect on playability. Still, these new disks are, to me, the obvious next step.

SupermediaStore and Meritline now carry these disks in both CD and DVD-R variants. Taiyo Yuden makes an 8x DVD-R version. I note that they sell for about $1 each, with very little discount for large quantities (why discount, when you have a corner on the market?). Still, the conventional way I'm looking at $.30 for the disk and $.20 for the label plus the hassle and labor of attachment. I'll buy them as soon as my stock of regular Taiyo Yuden DVD-Rs runs out.

EDIT:

Rima has them for $.84 each. The label is also full-face, giving more flexibility for disk artwork.

Comments

Tom Pauncz wrote on 10/25/2006, 4:37 PM
Very interesting. What was the printer you used?
Tom
DGates wrote on 10/25/2006, 5:20 PM
Are you not ordering from Discmakers because they don't have the DVD-R's yet?
john-beale wrote on 10/25/2006, 7:28 PM
I got some Taiyo Yuden "Watershield" 16x DVD-R from Rima.com, which look very nice when printed.
http://www.rima.com/Merchant2/merchant.mv?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=R&Product_Code=1778-50&Category_Code=GP

These are TYG03 media ID, and do not show as low an error rate when scanned as the older 8x TYG02 media, so I wish I could find TY 8x glossy media. Does Supermedia or Meritline have true Taiyo Yuden 8x DVD-R in glossy?
riredale wrote on 10/25/2006, 10:02 PM
You're right--the "Watershield" disks only come in 16x. Are you saying that they don't burn as well, even if burned at 8x?
john-beale wrote on 10/25/2006, 11:34 PM
Yes, the 16x TYG03 media always shows a higher error rate when scanned on my drives (BenQ DW1640 and Plextor PX-712a) than TYG02 does. I am burning these only at 8x, since 16x burns are even worse. There may be burners out there that work better with it, but the consensus I've heard from people who look into this sort of thing (see for example http://club.cdfreaks.com/showthread.php?t=80885 ) is that the TY 16x media is simply not as good as the 8x. Don't get me wrong, it's still OK and fine for most purposes, but the error scans are better on 8x TY02 and I always strive to get make the best possible product for my customers.

Fortunately Taiyo Yuden haven't stopped making 8x DVD-R media, and that's what I use for everything that doesn't really need the glossy look.
MH_Stevens wrote on 10/26/2006, 4:49 AM
Do you need a special printer or just a disk scribe?
DGates wrote on 10/26/2006, 5:36 AM
I did mine on my regular Epson R200
JJKizak wrote on 10/26/2006, 7:12 AM
RIredale:
Which printer did you use?
JJK
riredale wrote on 10/26/2006, 8:35 AM
I haven't printed any of the new disks yet. In the past, the only workable solution for me was to use the glossy Meritline labels and an Epson pigment-ink printer. That combination also created good-looking smear-proof, waterproof, and fade-proof labels. But there was (is) the added hassle of attaching the labels, which I did with a stomper alignment tool and a rolling-pin/cloth technique. I've never had any issue with any of the many hundreds of DVDs and CDs that I've created, but the new disks will obviously be a better way to go. As far as I can tell, any dye or pigment inkjet printer should do okay. The only issue, of course, is that one needs a printer that can print to a disk. My Epson won't, but I just bought a Canon printer with such a capability, so we'll see. The Epson pigment printers can be a pain anyway; I suspect the pigment inks eventually clog up the nozzles--we've gone through 3 Epson printers in 5 years.
Stuart Robinson wrote on 10/26/2006, 9:39 AM
I don't suppose any of you have seen a UK source for the new AquaGuard/Watershield discs?

Oh, and are there any DVD-9 versions yet, preferably in DVD+R form?

Thanks!
john-beale wrote on 10/26/2006, 5:23 PM
I recall when they first came out the DVD-9 recordable discs were much inferior to DVD+/-R as far as compatibility with the installed base of DVD players. That was the reason (in addition to unit cost) that I never considered using them.

However, I do sometimes get asked to record events over two hours, and quality suffers on a DVD-5, but people typically don't like a 2-disc set. Is DVD-9 media good enough for professional use yet? eg, I can confidently sell them and not have them returned as unplayable?
riredale wrote on 10/26/2006, 6:18 PM
I think there is one disk, a DVD+R from Verbatim, that is pretty much universally playable as long as the booktype is set to DVD-Rom. The disks burn at 8x in many burners. I have not used them much, but have never had a readability issue.
Stuart Robinson wrote on 10/26/2006, 6:24 PM
>I think there is one disk, a DVD+R from Verbatim, that is pretty much universally playable as long as the booktype is set to DVD-ROM.<

Exactly. I've made many, many DVD-9 projects using these blanks, right from their introduction. The key is to get a burner that can change the book type to DVD-ROM, then they're fine. On the other hand, DVD-R DL discs are not widely supported.