Do you primarily use your media drives to play CDs and DVDs? Do you ever get tired of having Windows ask you what you want to do when you pop in the disc?
You can tell Windows to automatically play that CD or DVD as soon as you put it in the drive! How? By activating Window’s AutoPlay feature. Follow these steps:
On your Windows PC, get into Windows Explorer, also called My Computer or Computer.
Find the CD or DVD drive on which you would like a CD or DVD to automatically play upon insertion into the drive.
Right-click on the drive and click Properties.
Click the AutoPlay tab at the top of the window.
Under Actions, click “Select an action to perform.”
Click on the action to perform. If you have multiple media players on your PC, you must choose one.
Click Apply, and click OK.
If you have two drives, repeat the steps above for the other drive. Now, whenever you put that CD or DVD into the drive, it should automatically begin to play. Won't it be nice to not have that annoying small window popping up every time you insert a CD or DVD asking you what you want to do?
What is the difference between digital and analog? Well, before the digital age, audio and video was stored in a format called analog and the media that contained the analogue signals includes vinyl records of various sizes (33, 45, 78), cassette tapes, and VHS tapes.
An analog recording captured the actual audio and video waves as a continuous stream of data and transferred these waves onto a physical medium – such as the groove of a record, or the iron oxide surface of a magnetic tape.
Analog recordings tended to deteriorate with time because of their dependence on the physical medium.
A digital audio or video recording does not capture the entire stream of data. Instead, it takes samples of the video and audio thousands of times a second, converts the data into a large series of numbers (1s and 0s), and then stores these numbers in a file on a computer, CD, or DVD disc.
Digital recordings do not deteriorate and, because they are numerical, they can often be compressed in order to create a smaller file size - such as with mp3 files.
Audio and video files on the computer or Internet are digital. These files are very large, especially video, so for Internet transfer, they must be compressed – or made smaller. A special program, called a codec, compresses the file without compromising quality. The word codec is short for “compress/decompress,” or possibly "code/decode."
When playing a digital audio or video file, the computer software or the playback device that is used must also use a codec program to decompress the video – to return it to its original series of 1s and 0s.
There are many audio and video codecs in use, and most media playing software and playback devices only support a subset of the total available. Some video codecs are: MEG-1, MPEG-2 MPEG-4, Vorbis, and DiVX- based on MPEG-4. Some audio codecs are: WAV and MP3.
Video streaming is quickly bypassing DVDs as folks' choice for watching movies, documentaries, and other video files. Services such as Netflix, Amazon Prime, and Acorn-TV provide the ability to watch online and no longer buy DVDs.
However, there is still a core of folks that want their favorite television shows or movies on a physical medium, and want to be able to record certain television shows or movies from cable, satellite, or over-the-air transmission. In addition, although you may purchase TV shows and movies on streaming websites, there is no guarantee these videos are yours to keep forever. When contracts change between the copyright holder and video streaming service, you lose your video!
You can also still buy DVD recorders on which to record shows and movies, but it is getting harder to record for personal use due to movie studios and television stations adding copy-protection schemes to their broadcasts. Well, for those that persevere, here is what you need to know about purchasing DVDs for recording, data backup, or copying.
There are several different kinds of blank DVD discs. The most common formats are DVD-R and DVD-RW, and DVD+R and DVD+RW. The "R" stands for recordable, and the "W" stands for writeable.
DVD-RAM is an older format and is quickly becoming obsolete. Therefore, don't buy a DVD recorder that relies on DVD-RAM technology and do not purchase DVD-RAM discs to record upon. Even if your current DVD player supports DVD-RAM discs, your friends' DVD players may not, nor will your future DVD player.
A DVD-R or DVD+R blank disc can only be written to one time. A DVD-RW or DVD+RW blank disc can be written to countless times and, as such, are more expensive. You can even erase files from a RW disc.
However, DVD-RW or DVD+RW discs should only be used for data storage as DVD players often have trouble playing them. DVD-R or DVD+R discs should be used for recording movies, or for copying files to give to a friend.
Years ago, the - and + formats were in competition. There are differences in the technology used for burning, but most modern computers and DVD players support both types and this will probably not change in the future. However, read the manual that came with your DVD player. And if you have a DVD recorder, read the manual to understand which types of DVDs are supported for recording purposes.
Also, before purchasing blank discs, consider the brand name. Cheap DVDs are often unreliable, and if you are going to go to the trouble of burning a DVD, it makes sense to send a little more money on good quality discs. We have used Verbatim for years and have had only a handful of "coasters." We usually find them reasonably priced on amazon.com. Other high-quality discs are Taiyo Yuden, Ricoh, and Ritek.
There are also different DVD formats depending on where you live. DVD players in the U.S. usually only support NTSC format. PAL is the format commonly used in Europe.
