DVD/CD

[G-ALAN]

Please excuse my ignorance but can someone tell me the difference between DVDrom and CDrom?

Speaking to some bloke in a well known computer game shop, told me most PC games are now DVD based. I asked him, "what the hell does that mean", but he didn't know. I picked up a couple of PC game boxes and sure enough the letters DVD are in the place where CDrom used to be. I have no idea what this is all about. Does it make the game run faster or something? Do I need special hardware to run a DVD game or will it run in my CDrom/ DVD player already built into my computer?

[spannersatcx]

DVD capacity 4.3GB, CD capacity 700mb, 1 DVD saves producing a game on 6 CD's.

[Richard Spandit]

I've always wondered, since recordable DVDs and CDs both use a laser to change the colour of a dye, but the DVD at a higher resolution - would it not be possible to burn a DVD at a lower resolution (700mb) so that it could be used in a CD player? Not quite sure why you'd want to do this, but I'm bored...

[spannersatcx]

you'll need to read the comparison here (http://www.videointerchange.com/dvd.htm#How%20DVDs%20Work) the only thing that is the same is the physical size of the disks.

[G-ALAN]

Thanks, so it's just a size thing then? Will my CDrom read the DVD software? It has an inbuilt DVD player which isn't working, do I need to get this fixed in order to play DVD based software?

[ZH875]

A DVD player can read a CD, but a CD player cannot read a DVD. The physical arrangement of the tracks are closer together on a DVD, so much so, that a CD player would try to read many tracks at the same time if it could, as the CD player uses a much wider beam to read a CD than a DVD player uses to read a DVD.

Then there is Blue-Ray......

[spannersatcx]

Will my CDrom read the DVD softwareNO

It has an inbuilt DVD player which isn't working, do I need to get this fixed in order to play DVD based software?Yes, and Yes