Hi Jim !

I did a brief search & found some stuff on Amazon, but it didn't say anything about LS being a feature.

Do you have a link?

I don't see a point to buying BlueRays. The only thing you can play a BD-E is on a BlueRay player.

Not media centers. Not on Windows. Not on Mac. Not on Linux. There are no decent players for the BlueRay format right now. Sony has a tight hold on who creates software for BlueRay. And they are restricting everything. I guess they really want to sell those BlueRau players.

So if you bought a BlueRay LightScribe disc you could... make a back up of your BlueRay movies...?

Really, that's it? I'm not buying them.

Hey Jim, could I get that info too? I just bought my Lightscribe BD-RE drive and of course I was hoping for a quick release of LS BD-R's...

I know it has been 4 months since your post, but when I asked Google for Lightscribe BD a second ago, it actually gave me this post as one of the top results.

And @ dman, there are plenty good Blu-Ray players & compatible systems out there - you just gotta open your eyes. As for uses... if I wanted to, I could put ~24 gigs of Mp3's onto a single disc that my HT-System could play.. I havn't gotten that bored yet though. However as a photographer & designer it gives me a perfect solution to create interchangable libraries of Images etc.  I am also planning on making ISO images of old CD's and burning them onto a blu-ray - giving me the option of opening them with a virtual drive. So rather than having to shuffle through 250 CD's I can simply have around 7 Blu-Ray discs next to my computer. 

Oh and to get to that: "here are no decent players for the BlueRay format right now."    Check out the BDP 7500 MKII from Philips, its a standalone system that can also play most PC formats, even from a USB storage device or a Data DVD / Data BluRay. But all that is beside the point I want LS BD-R's and I want them soon!

Don

Oh I love BluRay! 1080p is awesome. I can no longer go to a Movie Theater unless it's a Digital Movie(not film).

But you have misunderstood my point. If I burn a video on a BluRay and give it to my friend James, he can't do anything with it. He doesn't have a BluRay player.

BUT if I burn it onto a DVD, he can watch it on a PC, on a Mac, and on his home-made Media Center(which is Linux based). BluRay is worthless on all of these platforms. This is because there is no software for it. There is not a program that can play BluRay for PC, Mac or Linux.

     The projected release date for the Verbatim Lightscribe enabled Bluray blanks was slated for the second quarter of 2011 so I suppose the best bet is to keep checking from April or May on. Don't forget "projected" is not an absolute. Production runs are constantly delayed due to dozens of unforeseen circumstances. Add to that the pre-2009 Blu-ray player incompatibilities that are appearing with the newer LTH series of BD-R blanks, the increasing move to slower or stagnant write speeds (for compatibility issues and computer hardware limitations) and the picture just gets muddier.

     As far as playing Blu-ray discs on PCs there are several mainstream software packages that will allow Blu-ray discs to be played when installed on a hardware capable PC. Cyberlink is one software provider that comes to mind. In summary, to play Blu-ray movies on your computer you need: a Blu-ray drive, an HDCP compliant video card, an HDCP compliant monitor, and software with Blu-ray support. As to the perceived advantage of using Blu-ray on a home PC that's a whole other discussion. The visual image improvement in the 1080 Blu-ray format over DVD-video is generally considered to be appreciated only in screen sizes of larger than 37" to 40". There are several very good  Hi Definition forums that exist that contain hours of reading on transfer rates, storage capacity, Blu-ray and AVCHD formats, etc. Don't forget that generally speaking it is the data format that should be the deciding factor, not the labeling method. I would agree that with the higher temperatures involved in Blu-ray playback I personally would not use paper labels. At this point I think inkjet or Lightscribe labeling for "home movie" archive discs are the only prudent professional looking labeling choices.

     Personally I am burning my HiDef home video onto DVD-R Lightscribe discs using the AVCHD format. The upside is that it is relatively inexpensive, extremely compatible with home DVD players and provides a visually very good 1920 x 1080 image. I can also use SDHC cards as a reuseable recording media for playback in compatible home players. (widely compatible with late model Sony and Panasonic Blu-ray home players)  The downside is that at the quality I record at (17Mbps VBR) a DVD-R disc only holds about 50 minutes to an hour of video. The original prime file however is retained for future BD-R (or whatever the next mainstream format may be) use.       

Thanks Jim.

 Yes dman, I must have inherently misunderstood your point. Probably because I have never considered giving someone else one of my discs. If I would have to give something away, I'd probably ask them what format disc they require and make a copy for them. I generally don't give any of my optical discs away if I have a choice.

Anyway - thanks again.

I got this email from Verbatim today:

"There has not been an official announcement, but it is on the road map for 2011Q4 or early 2012 production which translates into a Q2 2012 launch"

I suppose usability depends on what you're trying to do.

For creating 1080p wedding videos for my customers, BluRay would be a fantastic way to deliver the HD video, but they look so unprofessional with my handwritten labelling that I won't do it.  I downsample to DVD and give them a DVD with a nice professional looking lightscribe label.

I'll disagree. Power DVD has been able to play BluRay discs for quite a while now, and there are other programs specific to BluRay that work under PC and Mac.  I presume also under Linux, but I don't know.