Step-By-Step: Burn Your Own DVDs for Backup or Video Playback

Here's how to install a DVD drive and transfer videotape to DVD.

Stan Miastkowski is a PC World contributing editor. Contact him at stan_miastkowski@pcworld.com. Click here for past Step-By-Step columns.

Most PC technologies don't become popular until they drop to a price where making a purchase decision is relatively easy. And that's exactly what's happened to DVD writers over the past few months. A year ago the $500-plus price of a DVD burner made it the province of early adopters and users with deep pockets. But DVD writers are now hovering around the $200 to $250 range for internal models, making them a wise upgrade for many PCs manufactured in the last couple of years. External DVD drives, which plug into a FireWire or USB 2.0 port, are much easier to install but cost an extra $75 to $100 over internal drives.

The middle letter in DVD stands for versatile, and the 4.7GB capacity of write-once (DVD-R and DVD+R) and rewritable (DVD-RW and DVD+RW) media makes such discs versatile indeed. Write-once DVDs are excellent for archiving important data, and rewritable DVD media can serve as extra 4.7GB drives, for on-the-fly backups or everyday storage. DVD drives also read standard CD-ROMs, and write both CD-R and CD-RW discs.

One popular application for DVD writers is to use them to create video DVDs--from your digital camcorder or analog videotape collection--that you can pop into a standard DVD player and enjoy in the comfort of your living room. (See "From Videotape to DVD" on the last page.)

Formats and Speeds

Write-once and rewritable DVDs are available in two types: DVD-R/RW and DVD+R/RW. The formats were created by competing industry groups, and for a while it looked as if many users would have to pick a format and hope their choice wasn't the loser. But manufacturers have come up with a neat solution: Most DVD writers are now a combination design, offering support for both formats. We don't have space here to delve into the pros and cons of each, but the short story is that (for video) DVD+R is more compatible with standard DVD players. For additional background, see "Buying DVD Burners Gets Easier" and "Is It Time to Upgrade to Rewritable DVD?"

Most drives now support 4X writing for DVDs, although 4X-compatible media is currently rather expensive and hard to find. But all 4X drives will also write at 2X, and 2X media is affordable and readily available. Prices for DVD media vary considerably, but figure on spending $2 to $4 per disc, depending on the format and whether it's write-once or rewritable.

Most DVD burners come with a wide selection of backup, packet-writing, and digital-video software. For help in choosing a suitable drive, check out our Top 10 DVD Drives chart.

Some words of caution: You'll need plenty of PC horsepower to write DVDs. Your system should have a CPU that runs at 1 GHz or faster, and 256MB of RAM is a bare minimum; 512MB of memory--or more--will make life much easier.

The Top Down

Benefits: Create DVDs from videotape, make large-scale data backups, use as a 4.7GB drag-and-drop drive.

Costs: Internal, $200 to $300; external, $300 to $400

Expertise Level: Beginner-intermediate

Time Required: 30 to 60 minutes

Tools Required: Needle-nose pliers, Phillips-head screwdriver, antistatic wrist strap (recommended)

Vendors:Hewlett-Packard, Iomega, LaCie, LG Electronics, Memorex, Pioneer, Plextor, Sony, TDK, Toshiba

1. Plan the Drive Installation.

Unplug your PC and remove the cover. Since a DVD writer requires a continuous flow of data for creating discs, it should ideally be installed as the master drive on its own IDE channel. In most systems, your hard drive will be attached to the primary IDE channel, so you'll want to use the secondary IDE channel. Don't put your DVD burner on the same channel as a hard drive--the hard drive may slow down.

If you already have a CD-ROM or CD-R/RW drive connected to your secondary IDE channel and plan to keep it (not a bad idea for directly copying CD-ROMs), change that drive's jumper to "Slave."

Before you go any further, make sure the jumper on the DVD burner is set to "Master."

For more on this topic, see the September 2002 column "Get Maximum Speed From Your New Drives".

2. Install the DVD Drive.

Find a free 5.25-inch bay in the front of your case. If your case requires special brackets for holding externally accessible drives, install those first. Slide the drive part of the way into the bay. If your secondary IDE channel already has a CD drive, you should find a spare connector on the wide data cable. If not, use the cable that came with the DVD writer. Make sure that the colored edge of the data cable is attached to pin 1 on the DVD drive.

Attach a power connector to the DVD drive. If you can't find a free one, you'll need a Y-adapter, available at most PC stores.

In some cases, your DVD drive and sound card may require you to connect small analog and/or digital sound cables to the back of the drive. Check your manuals.

When all cables are connected, slide the drive fully into the bay. If your case doesn't use mounting brackets or rails, secure the drive with four screws.

3. Install the Software.

Replace the cover on your PC, plug in the system, and turn it on. Versions of Windows above 98 should automatically detect and install the burner.

Insert the CD-ROM that came with your drive and follow the directions for installing the software packages (which vary by DVD maker). This may require several reboots.

4. Activate DMA Transfer for Maximum Performance.

In Windows 98 and Me, right-click My Computer, choose Properties, click the Device Manager tab, double-click first CD-ROM and then the name of the DVD drive. Click the Settings tab, check the DMA box, and click OK. Follow the on-screen directions. Then restart your PC.

Windows 2000 and XP usually are set up to activate DMA if the drive supports it. To check, right-click My Computer (on the desktop, or on the Start menu in XP) and choose Properties. Select the Hardware tab, click the Device Manager button, and double-click IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers. Next, double-click the channel (usually Secondary) that the DVD drive is connected to, and click Advanced Settings. The Transfer Mode drop-down list should show DMA if available. If not, fix it.

From Videotape To DVD

Making video DVDs from videotapes is one of the big attractions of buying a rewritable DVD drive. Here's a summary of the process.

1. Video from a digital video camcorder feeds into a FireWire or USB 2.0 port (depending on which port type the camcorder supports) and is stored on the hard disk.

2. Video from an analog camcorder (VHS, 8mm, Hi-8) or VCR feeds into an analog capture card or an external USB 2.0 capture box (see find.pcworld.com/38300, for example), which converts it to digital format. The digital version is stored on the hard disk.

3. Through software (included with the DVD burner), you can create DVD menus, convert the stored digital video into the MPEG-2 format of video DVDs, and write it to the DVD media.

4. The resulting DVD can play on most stand-alone DVD players, although some older players may have trouble handling it.