LightScribe info for CD/DVD burners inquiries

[mojo1701]

With some of the money that I received for Christmas, I am looking to purchase a DVD burner, so I can back up the multitudes of files on my laptop, and saw a few that had Lightscribe capability.

What I'm looking for from you is opinions and info about Lightscribe: should I be interested in something like this? Should I get it? Should I ignore it?

Thanks.

 

[Krieg]

LightScribe just lets you burn a greyscale image onto the face of a compatible CD/DVD (I'm guessing you already know that).

The primary problem I've seen is that the lightscribe media is expensive as all get out, 2-3 times as much as media that can printed on by photo printers. It also takes 15-25 minutes or so to burn the image onto the disc which is pretty excessive.

All in all I would say it isn't a good deal right now, but if you find a LightScribe enabled burner for about the same price as a regular one it can't hurt to pick it up although I certainly wouldn't pay a premium for it.

 

[Dire Bare]

I actually work for HP customer service, although I'm not at work now.

Lightscribe is definitely not a must-have, but it is pretty cool (I think).

The labels you can create won't peel off like adhesive labels, and they look very professional (which somewhat depends on how you design the label itself, of course).

They do take a while to "burn" and they are only monochrome (overall an amber sort of color as opposed to being truly greyscale). The media is more expensive, but not on the scale mentioned above. Don't buy your media from HP, shop around for the best price like you would any type of disc media.

You can use non-Lightscribe media in the drive to create CDs and DVDs, you just can't make the labels. The Lightscribe media basically is a coating on the front of the disc that allows for the label to be burned.

The most recent drives available are the DVD740i and DVD740e ("i" for internal and "e" for external).

Hope that helps