There are pro’s and con’s to converting video to DVD. On the one hand DVD is cheap and fairly reliable, on the other it’s highly compressed and easily damaged. MPEG 2 is a compression format which is an in between format in terms of size and quality. The disadvantage is that DVD is prone to scratches and the long term storage of data is questionable. Some manufactures are claiming 25 years and more, but then what? The tapes are long gone and the DVD goes faulty, you’re stuck. We suggest that any data copied onto any optical media be backed up onto flash or hard drives, and multiple copies of this data be stored in different locations. Cloud is an option, but with a 4.7 GB disc it does not take long to use up your allocated space. If you intend editing from the MPEG2 files we suggest looking at converting to another digital file such as AVI, QuickTime or at the very least MP4. All of the above applies generally to SD formats such as analogue video and digital video in the DV codec.
In the next blog, we will discuss the advantages of converting to digital file types.