Blu-Ray Burner; Buy now or wait?

[Fontano]

I am looking to purchase a blu-ray burner.
They are in the $200 range now, and the disks are around $20 each.

I am looking for it to:
75% data backups
25% home video

Would you purchase one of the current generation of burners, or hang tight for the next generation.

[davring]

I have been doing alot of research on them as well, but I am still on the fence.

[Grentz]

I would hang tight.

For backups I would look into an external hard drive. Cheap way to get a lot of storage for archiving and you can rewrite/append backups to it (for me that is important as my data changes a lot).

Burnable Optical Media is not the greatest for backups even though it seems like it would be. The problem is the material on many disks will degrade over time. There are now archival CDs for home use, but most of the bluray disks are still unrated/tested as archival quality as of yet.

[Fontano]

I would hang tight.

For backups I would look into an external hard drive. Cheap way to get a lot of storage for archiving and you can rewrite/append backups to it (for me that is important as my data changes a lot).

Burnable Optical Media is not the greatest for backups even though it seems like it would be. The problem is the material on many disks will degrade over time. There are now archival CDs for home use, but most of the bluray disks are still unrated/tested as archival quality as of yet.

I do agree, that external hard drives are a good option.
Currently all my data hard drives are RAID-1, to protect from hardware failure.

I do haev a series of drives on the shelf, that pop into external storage enclosures to backup to, to protect from deletes.

Then I also take that data to another media type (back in the day it was tapes, then CDs, then DVDs).

I would then take that DVD and take it to my in-laws, parents, siblings house.
(right now it is my in-laws, as they have the fire-proof safe now)

And keep a copy there. (Note these disks are 99% pictures and videos)

I would love to backup to a DT tape, but just haven't found a practical price on one.
And I just don't trust the online backup sites for longer term storage backup.

[Tinymon]

Remember that if your data is important that you also want an off-site copy. I have two external HD's and keep one at a friend's house. I'll make an update then swap it for the one at my friend's. It's important in case of fire or stuff like that.

[hdtvfan0001]

Fontano:

Here's an internal Blue Ray drive that will be on sale at Best Buy on Black Friday for $99:

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=8844655&st=lg%20blu-ray&lp=2&type=product&cp=1&id=1208562591968&AID=10597222&PID=1418914&URL=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.bestbuy.com%2Fsite%2Folspage. jsp%3FskuId%3D8844655%26st%3Dlg+blu-ray%26lp%3D2%26type%3Dproduct%26cp%3D1%26id%3D1208 562591968&ref=39&loc=01

I'm thinking of picking up one of these myself...

ARGHH....never mind...this is Blu Ray read only, but Read/Write for everything else. Sorry - I now read the fine print.

[Fontano]

ARGHH....never mind...this is Blu Ray read only, but Read/Write for everything else. Sorry - I now read the fine print.

Not a problem, the reps (and myself) made the initial same mistake when I looked at it over the weekend. The packaging just makes it look like a burner (and the general assumption now that the drives are burners)

[Chuck W]

I am currently running a setup of an external raid enclosure with 3 Seagate 500g in Raid 5 to store my photos. While raid 5 is good protection, I also back up my photos to Blu-Ray(when I have enough to fill a disk). I currently have the LG GGW-H20L which has done a good job for me. Not the fastest thing in the world, but it has been solid.

[Fontano]

I am currently running a setup of an external raid enclosure with 3 Seagate 500g in Raid 5 to store my photos. While raid 5 is good protection, I also back up my photos to Blu-Ray(when I have enough to fill a disk). I currently have the LG GGW-H20L which has done a good job for me. Not the fastest thing in the world, but it has been solid.

Not too worried about the speeds.
I remember when I had my first CD Burner, and had to let it run overnight to burn a CD.

To backup the data, not really worried about seeting it up before bedtime and checking it in the morning.

[Steve Mehs]

When I ordered my new PC a few meonths ago from HP, I didn't think twice, I went with the BD Burner. It was only a $100 upgrade to go from the BD-ROM/HD DVD Drive to the BD Burner/HD DVD Drive. I haven't burned anything on Blu Ray yet as I really have no need to at this point, and the media is too expensive still.

[xIsamuTM]

until the market gets more saturated I'd stick with dual layer DVD's. 8 gigs can hold a 26 episode series with room to spare (30 minute tv show, Dual Audio, subs). besides, the more compact the data gets on a disc, the more damage small scratches make.