Just discovered lightscribe~

[sonic]

:D I got my laptop last october & am just now discovering "lightscribe" :-0

am actually proud of myself for figuring out how to use it & have made 3 DVD labels so far. does anyone else love this feature?

http://www.lightscribe.com/

[o0vL]

doesnt it take like 40 mins to burn an image on the CD? <--that was as per HP on TSC, either way i have it on one PC at home...havent bothered to use it

[kud0s69]

It doesn't take 60 mins. It does take a lot longer than the actual burning though. Every time I burn a lightscribe for someone, they are really impressed. That being said, I have used lightscribe like 3 times :D

[MkmBandit]

Lightscribe is a piss-poor investment. I paid $169.99 for my lightscribe drive just after it hit the market, I really should have just spent $60 on a normal drive.

con- uses special discs, costs more and harder to find
con- prints only in one colour, diarrhoea brown
con- takes 45 minutes to print the label
con- you gotta take out the disc and flip it to get the label printed

pro- the black drive matches my case

Its garbage technology in my opinion, nothing special. Truth be told, I'm much happier with my Verbatim white label print discs and my red sharpie.

>:(

[rfdrfd]

Can you take some pics of your discs with the pretty labels?

Yes, it does take a long time, but I also think it will look very professional, esp. if you are giving a DVD or CD to someone after a wedding or something.

[sonic]

yes, this is why i like it..its great for personalizing home movies or for giving as gifts..i can even burn my photos on a disk.

I use Roxio to burn it ..there are 3 settings...normal, fast, & faster. the longest it took to burn was 15 minutes. ;)

also the disks cost a bit more than everyday dvd-r's...i got 30 verbatim for $33-

[al3x89]

Lightscribe is a piss-poor investment. I paid $169.99 for my lightscribe drive just after it hit the market, I really should have just spent $60 on a normal drive.

con- uses special discs, costs more and harder to find
con- prints only in one colour, diarrhoea brown
con- takes 45 minutes to print the label
con- you gotta take out the disc and flip it to get the label printed

pro- the black drive matches my case

Its garbage technology in my opinion, nothing special. Truth be told, I'm much happier with my Verbatim white label print discs and my red sharpie.

>:(

+1

My printer prints on CDs. I like that better than my black sharpie! :D

[Tijuana]

+1

My printer prints on CDs. I like that better than my black sharpie! :D

But how much ink does it use?

[al3x89]

But how much ink does it use?

It's just like printing a picture, or printing letters (like if your typing MUSIC CD).

Doesn't waste too much ink.

[Kasakato]

But how much ink does it use?

Buy a slightly older printer and cheap ink is plentiful. I buy colour ink cartilages at $5, and black at $2 each. Far cheaper than Lightscribe.

[Chookman]

I like it and use it for special DVDs. I've used large graphics that cover the full area and highest quality setting and the time comes in at slightly over 20mins to burn the image in. Would I pay extra for it? Maybe $5-$10 on the cost of the drive at most. Back when I was looking at the drive to buy, the Pioneer was $55 without LS and the Benq was $60 with LS. I opted for the Benq for the extra $5 and the reviews had the performance of Pioneer/Benq as pretty much equal quality.

[Tijuana]

Buy a slightly older printer and cheap ink is plentiful. I buy colour ink cartilages at $5, and black at $2 each. Far cheaper than Lightscribe.

where the hell do you buy these lol

[rabbit]

Lightscribe is okay. It's nice to have that option.

I prefer Labelflash, but it doesn't really exist in North America (eg. can't buy LF discs).

Labelflash has a nicer silver/blue surface, unlike Lightscribe's gold (although LS does have some coloured CD-Rs, and supposedly, DVD Rs coming).

Labelflash doesn't require driver software + Windows service to work.

Labelflash integrates Yamaha's DiscT@2, although only for DVD Rs. Yeah, it's not the greatest technology, but it's nice to have the *option*.

[Kasakato]

where the hell do you buy these lol

eBay. :lol:

[Tijuana]

eBay. :lol:

need more info lol, what printer do you use, and what about the sheets too? I'm guessing I can get those on ebay, but what program would I use? I used to have one, but I couldn't never get the same package twice, so id need to install a new proggie every time, cause the sheets are different sizes, anyways so yes, please help me out :razz:

[Goonish]

Most standard DVD drives come with LS now anyways and you can find those drives nowadays for $25 to $30. Not exactly a hefty investment. The prices on LS discs are dropping as well...

While I still prefer the old Sharpie for my own archives, having the LS option there for special occasions is nice. I just burned a CD full of baby pictures for a buddy of mine and had the kid's face on the disc. ;)

[Tijuana]

Im surprised they havent created a colour version, ie have a several layers of colours in a disc, covered by a white material. Then the needle would press down as much as needed to show that certain colour, doesnt seem that hard to make, but I'm sure there would be a way

[Kasakato]

need more info lol, what printer do you use, and what about the sheets too? I'm guessing I can get those on ebay, but what program would I use? I used to have one, but I couldn't never get the same package twice, so id need to install a new proggie every time, cause the sheets are different sizes, anyways so yes, please help me out :razz:

Im just using my standard HP all in one 2610 with Fellowes CD labels and software (Neato Labeler). I think I paid $20-30 for 100 labels. The kit I got included an application device, but I am pretty sure you can get them for $5-10 if you look.

[BMNB3tches]

Lightscribe is a piss-poor investment. I paid $169.99 for my lightscribe drive just after it hit the market, I really should have just spent $60 on a normal drive.

con- uses special discs, costs more and harder to find
con- prints only in one colour, diarrhoea brown
con- takes 45 minutes to print the label
con- you gotta take out the disc and flip it to get the label printed

pro- the black drive matches my case

Its garbage technology in my opinion, nothing special. Truth be told, I'm much happier with my Verbatim white label print discs and my red sharpie.

>:(

-1

The LightScribe feature is becoming a standard among laptop drives. Too bad for you going out of the way to get one. I like mine, considering it came with the drive.

[Tijuana]

Im just using my standard HP all in one 2610 with Fellowes CD labels and software (Neato Labeler). I think I paid $20-30 for 100 labels. The kit I got included an application device, but I am pretty sure you can get them for $5-10 if you look.

what about ink, ebay as well or do you fill it yourself?

[lorax1284]

this was months ago... still only 'black' ink, but the disc faces were in five different colours: red orange yellow green blue... with the stock 'gold' colour, you have six different colours of CDs.

I made some mixed CDs and used one colour for each of 5 of them... a nice little set, actually.

http://www.futureshop.ca/catalog/proddetail.asp?logon=&langid=EN&sku_id=0665000FS10089258&catid=

They were on for $19.99 for 25: I bought two packs.

Got matching 5 colour paper CD sleeves at NCIX.COM for cheeeeeap... something like 99¢ for 50.

Fun!

[al3x89]

need more info lol, what printer do you use, and what about the sheets too? I'm guessing I can get those on ebay, but what program would I use? I used to have one, but I couldn't never get the same package twice, so id need to install a new proggie every time, cause the sheets are different sizes, anyways so yes, please help me out :razz:

Ew sheets? lol

Mine prints right onto the disc. I slide the CD into the printer and it prints. :D

Plus, I got it for free. Thanks Apple :)

[Kasakato]

what about ink, ebay as well or do you fill it yourself?

Just the normal stock, genuine, expired ink. The ink will last a few years past the expiration date, but the printer is programed not to accept ink that is past due. A little date modification and your good to go.

[Tijuana]

Just the normal stock, genuine, expired ink. The ink will last a few years past the expiration date, but the printer is programed not to accept ink that is past due. A little date modification and your good to go.

meh seems too complicated, i guess ill just stick to marker

[Kasakato]

meh seems too complicated, i guess ill just stick to marker

All I do is unplug it from power/network/computer, turn it on, install the ink, plug the network/USB cables back in. As long as the ink is installed before the due date, it works fine. This is how HP works, not sure if the others do it as well.

[rabbit]

> Im surprised they havent created a colour version, ie have a several layers of colours in a disc, covered by a white material. Then the needle would press down as much as needed to show that certain colour, doesnt seem that hard to make, but I'm sure there would be a way

I think cost is more of an issue, plus you're not going to get photo quality; results would be more like a colour laser printer.

[MkmBandit]

-1

The LightScribe feature is becoming a standard among laptop drives. Too bad for you going out of the way to get one. I like mine, considering it came with the drive.

So what if its becoming standard, that doesn't make it worth using. When lightscribe first came out, it would have been unheard of to see it in a laptop. Between the huge price drops and the fact that they're in every HP laptop only proves that its a dying technology and HP is trying to revive it.

I picked up an HP dv2000 series laptop in January, it came with a lightscribe drive. I had the OS 'upgraded' to XP, and didn't even bother with the lightscribe drivers. I never said no-one would use it, you're proof of that, but theres nothing amazing about the technology, and its a real PITA to deal with. My opinion would be completely different if a) they made it possible to use more then one colour, b) if it supported the use of any blank label discs, OR c) if it didn't require flipping the disc to get the image burned. Take your pick. HP is capable of tackling at least one of my 3 main issues with it.

In the end, not having a lightscribe drive is NOT a deal breaker.

[kud0s69]

Lightscribe is a piss-poor investment. I paid $169.99 for my lightscribe drive just after it hit the market, I really should have just spent $60 on a normal drive.

con- uses special discs, costs more and harder to find
con- prints only in one colour, diarrhoea brown
con- takes 45 minutes to print the label
con- you gotta take out the disc and flip it to get the label printed

pro- the black drive matches my case

Its garbage technology in my opinion, nothing special. Truth be told, I'm much happier with my Verbatim white label print discs and my red sharpie.

>:(

Okay so your completely out of the loop. You paid 169 for a lightscribe drive????? WOW. I bought mine very soon after release in Canada for about 50 bucks, when the average DVD drive price was about 45 bucks. Gee 5 bucks.

You have a hard time finding lightscribe disks? Again, WOW. FS/staples has em, most other computer accessory places have them. Perhaps you just have not looked?

Last disk image I burned took 10 minutes. Not 45, or 60 mentioned elsewhere in this thread. Disc data burned in 2 mins or so, flipped the disk and the image was done in 10-15. Not like I had a stopwatch.

You actually list having to flip the disk being a con? Yeah thats a pretty difficult task, those cd trays unload so slow, and CD's are so bloody heavy these days.

As for the print color, they have colored disks. You don't need to have brown.


I hardly ever use the lightscribe portion. If I buy a new DVD drive, I will be buying another lightscribe drive. I do not burn many disks period, but every disk I have imaged through lightscribe comes out looking awesome. Very professional looking and it is "burned" onto a drive, preventing smudging or inkjet fading.

[kud0s69]

Can you take some pics of your discs with the pretty labels?

Yes, it does take a long time, but I also think it will look very professional, esp. if you are giving a DVD or CD to someone after a wedding or something.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0c/CDLabelLightScribe_WikipediaLogo.jpg

[MkmBandit]

Okay so your completely out of the loop. You paid 169 for a lightscribe drive????? WOW. I bought mine very soon after release in Canada for about 50 bucks, when the average DVD drive price was about 45 bucks. Gee 5 bucks.


Yes, $169.99 from Stooples. That was the going price when they came out, so obviously you got it a bit later then I did.



You have a hard time finding lightscribe disks? Again, WOW. FS/staples has em, most other computer accessory places have them. Perhaps you just have not looked?



I never said I had a hard time finding them.. I said it was HARDER to find them, and thats just the truth. You never shared your opinion on the price factor, so I'll assume thats a fact you choose not to address.


Last disk image I burned took 10 minutes. Not 45, or 60 mentioned elsewhere in this thread. Disc data burned in 2 mins or so, flipped the disk and the image was done in 10-15. Not like I had a stopwatch.


Maybe my drive just took that much longer.. And maybe it wasn't 45 minutes, but its still agonizingly slow. Not like I had a stopwatch either..


You actually list having to flip the disk being a con? Yeah thats a pretty difficult task, those cd trays unload so slow, and CD's are so bloody heavy these days.


Oh most definately. What kind of primitive technology standards do you live by? If I start the burn process and its going to take 20 minutes or more to burn the disk/image, I should be able to walk away from the computer and let it do its thing. The fact that it prompts me halfway through the burn process to flip the disc is, yes, a CON. I'm not alone in feeling its a PITA..

As for the print color, they have colored disks. You don't need to have brown.

Shows how long its been since I've used the technology.. So good, there are colour discs. I hope they're not limited to a single colour though, otherwise my opinion still stands..


When it comes down to it, opinions will be varied. Good for you for making use of it, I wish I could say the same.

[kud0s69]

Yes, $169.99 from Stooples. That was the going price when they came out, so obviously you got it a bit later then I did


I never said I had a hard time finding them.. I said it was HARDER to find them, and thats just the truth. You never shared your opinion on the price factor, so I'll assume thats a fact you choose not to address.



Maybe my drive just took that much longer.. And maybe it wasn't 45 minutes, but its still agonizingly slow. Not like I had a stopwatch either..



Oh most definately. What kind of primitive technology standards do you live by? If I start the burn process and its going to take 20 minutes or more to burn the disk/image, I should be able to walk away from the computer and let it do its thing. The fact that it prompts me halfway through the burn process to flip the disc is, yes, a CON. I'm not alone in feeling its a PITA..



Shows how long its been since I've used the technology.. So good, there are colour discs. I hope they're not limited to a single colour though, otherwise my opinion still stands..


When it comes down to it, opinions will be varied. Good for you for making use of it, I wish I could say the same.

You bought your drive at Stooples? OUCH. Stooples have always gouged CD/DVD writer prices. As does futureshop etc. They just can't compete with NCIX etc for prices on internal parts, not to mention if it is a new internal part technology. I remember specifically that my drive at Futureshop was 199.99 (retail box, of course). Went down and picked up the exact same drive - Brand and model number (OEM of course) from NCIX for around $50. Also we are talking years ago when I got my drive, probably right around the same time you got yours, if not earlier. I am guessing 5 years ago. When I bought it there was ZERO media on the market other than ebay from Japan. To be honest, I would not be suprised at all to find that we have the exact same BENQ drive. It was one of the first available semi-widely in Canada, unless you got yours from Stooples in Japan.

You have have to make real world comparisons here. Today, Lightscribe drives are pretty well the exact same price as non lightscribe drives. Same holds true for any technology. I would not use the arguement "I paid 20,000$ for my Blue Ray player 4 years ago, therefore Blue Ray is not worth it".

Bottom line, you can get a lightscribe burner for 30$ these days. In real world pricing this is a moot point.

Perhaps you also do not know. Lightscribe drives do not NEED special media. You can burn any dvd/cd in em. You do not NEED to etch anything if you do not want to. If you wanna go buy that 2$ spindle of knock off Taiyo Udens from the flea market, feel free. They will work in a lightscribe drive the exact same way they work in a non lightscribe drive. That would make the burn process for lightscribe the exact same as any other writer. If you want the etching, as painfull as this is, you will need to buy special *more expensive* disks and flip em over, but it is not a requirement. It should not be part of the deciding factor of a CON on a lightscribe drive. You can disable the lightscribe portion prompts in all software. Just click one button somewhere in the software settings and it will never ask you again if you wanna burn the lightscribe portion. You say it is primitive, but then again red sharpie on white label is sooooo modern.

I can burn a CD from start to finish in 2 minutes. Zero clicks extra clicks. And yep, I can burn white label disks and write on em with a red sharpie as well. The only difference, I find black sharpie on white label more attractive.

Like I said before. Do I use it a lot? No. Do I like having the option? Heck yes. There are no con's to lightscribe drives in my opinion.

So my pro's and cons for lightscribe would be:

PRO - Drive price only a few dollars more than a standard drive, and sometimes even in price.

PRO - Will burn any media, but you will have the additional *OPTION* of burning onto the lightscribe side of the disk. This option can be turned off permanently in the burning software settings, if you do not want to be prompted to turn the disk over.

PRO - Have professional looking images permanently etched onto the CD/DVD. Looks 10000x better than a sharpie.

[luthair]

Im surprised they havent created a colour version, ie have a several layers of colours in a disc, covered by a white material. Then the needle would press down as much as needed to show that certain colour, doesnt seem that hard to make, but I'm sure there would be a way

Its not a needle, its using a laser to etch the disk.

Be careful of the markers used on optical disks, remember that the data is stored closer to the top of the disk, if the dye is corrosive it could damage the disk, or it could lower the lifespan.

Edit: I had also wanted to say, I like the idea of LightScribe but the additional disk cost isn't justified imo.

[sonic]

this was months ago... still only 'black' ink, but the disc faces were in five different colours: red orange yellow green blue... with the stock 'gold' colour, you have six different colours of CDs.

I made some mixed CDs and used one colour for each of 5 of them... a nice little set, actually.

http://www.futureshop.ca/catalog/proddetail.asp?logon=&langid=EN&sku_id=0665000FS10089258&catid=

They were on for $19.99 for 25: I bought two packs.

Got matching 5 colour paper CD sleeves at NCIX.COM for cheeeeeap... something like 99¢ for 50.

Fun!

Thanks for the info~~
I was just at FS & didnt see any coloured dvd-rs :| do they make them for dvd-rs? or am i stuck with gold?
>:(

[LonesomeDove]

I wished they have dual layer light scribe discs. Are there any out there?

By the way, using those stick-on fellowes labels are not good for the discs.
Discs can be damaged or become unplayable because they are unbalanced.

[rabbit]

> I was just at FS & didnt see any coloured dvd-rs do they make them for dvd-rs? or am i stuck with gold?

Coloured LightScribe DVD Rs exist, but I guess stores are slow to pick them up. They're still relatively new.

[crazdefool]

Lightscribe is a piss-poor investment. I paid $169.99 for my lightscribe drive just after it hit the market, I really should have just spent $60 on a normal drive.

don't feel bad. I paid about $700 for an early Yamaha scsi caddy cd burner.
It paid for itself with all the ps1 games i burned :P

[woodstock827]

with Lightscribe drives costing little or no extra nowadays, and the DVD/CD also costs very slightly more, I use it all the time when I burn stuff.
The longest time it takes is less than 30minutes with best quality and full graphics. I don't need my discs right away most of the time anyway so the time is not really an issue for me.
I think they have Lightscribe discs in other colors now as well.. like blue or red.

[rabbit]

> doesn't the laser get weaker quicker?
and
on a laptop it would not be fun to have replace a broken dvd burner due to making silly labels.


Sure, everytime you write a disc, it wears on the laser.

Are notebook writers any good (for quality data writing) in the first place? Unless I have no other convenient option, I'm more inclined to attach a standard writer externally.

On the other hand, I don't think the drive matters when it comes to LightScribe quality :).

[ES_Revenge]

Lightscribe is a piss-poor investment. I paid $169.99 for my lightscribe drive just after it hit the market, I really should have just spent $60 on a normal drive.


WTH? What was that the day Lightscribe was released on the very first drive it came on? LOL. Sounds like a huge rip!

Because the way I rememeber it was that I bought a non-LS drive around the time when LS was pretty new. It wasn't like a week after it came out but it wasn't any crazy amount of time after, either. My drive (which was non-LS) was something like $40, and the LS version was like $15-$20 more, not anything crazy like $170 :confused:. I don't even think Yamaha F1 drives with T@2 (a different form of "labelling" which predated LS), cost $170, did they? And that was when optical drives were way more expensive in general.

I remember pretty clearly not wanting to spend $20 more on LS because I'd never use it. I've purchased a couple other optical drives since then with LS (since it's only like $5 more these days, if it's even an option and not standard already), but I still have yet to use the feature.

[rabbit]

> I don't even think Yamaha F1 drives with T@2 (a different form of "labelling" which predated LS), cost $170, did they?

I think they were; I think they cost more than Plextors. I paid $150 for the Plextor Premium, although they came a bit later than the F1.

[jasperException]

don't feel bad. I paid about $700 for an early Yamaha scsi caddy cd burner.
It paid for itself with all the ps1 games i burned :P

I paid about $550 from my 2X CDR burner from Panasonic and it died on me within 1 yr (good thing) and got it replaced with warranty. It also paid for itself with all the ps1 games I burned. :P

I like lightscribe. I used it to print onto my wii backup games and make it professional like with the original label. They have multiple colored disk but still a monocolor printing. Problem is because it is a monocolor printing and the the disc is not white colored.. you need to convert your image into grayscale and use contrast and brightness to change the image in such a way that when the image is printed, the final product looks sharp and good. You don't have to use this if the disc is white colored tho.

[lorax1284]

They have multiple colored disk but still a monocolor printing.

The reality is that to sit and use the design software to create the label / artwork can be fun and novel, but mostly, just scribbling on with a Sharpie is fine. If you ARE making, say, mixed CDs that you will want to play on a CD player, having pretty labels is nice, but for computer backups a Sharpie is the way to go.

Using printable labels for DVDs / CDs that are NOT computer backups would probably be OK: both DVD players and CD players after all spin the discs at "1 times" when they play back... but computer drives that spin up to 40 or 50 times speed can be damaged by labels that start to peel off or are not perfectly centered on the disc.