[MacDV] Formac Devideon DVD burner

[Rod Duncan]

Run... don't walk away from Formac. You must have missed my earlier 
posts on this company and their product. Grrrr!

In January I purchased the burner directly from them. After a major 
screwup on their part on the original order, I should have known 
then, if they can't even get an order straight how good can their 
hardware/software be? They DIDN'T inform me that  there would be a 
20% restocking/return fee if it was returned. In my case, it was 
within 2 weeks.

The Devideon software was Sloooooow to encode and unreliable (v.2) 
The drive is a Pioneer and available everywhere so all they are 
selling is a case design and software. Which in both instances was 
extremely poor.The case has a ridiculous swoopy design that you can't 
stack anything on and a Mickey Mouse cheapo spring device to kick 
open their flimsy plastic door when the Pioneer door opens 
underneath. All form and no function. The whole package and 
tech/customer support was so bad that I decided to eat the customer, 
stinging 20% which, as mentioned, had NOT been revealed to me by them 
at time of purchase. I pleaded my case with a couple of individuals 
at Formac explaining the situation. All to no avail.

My advice: Buy a bare Pioneer DVD burner and use an excellent case 
from either Firewire Depot or Firewire Direct which also includes a 
USB 2 port in addition to the firewire. Bare drives DVR-105's are 
currently priced at $149 US shipped at ESBuy.  Check dealmac online 
for the latest and best pricing. There are a couple of bundled deals 
there. Yes. Buy Roxio Toast Titanium. It will do it all for you. 
CD's, DVD's you name it. I couldn't live without Toast. If you are 
serious about music CD's get Roxio Jam, too.

Formac has a name that belies its true intent. They should call 
themselves ForFormac. I promised them I would post bad reviews 
whenever I had the chance.

"Don't get mad... get even!"

My 2 cents.

Rod



>I have a PB G4 Ti/400 with OS 9.2.2. I am contemplating to buy an
>external DVD burner. Reviews in U.S. and U.K. magazines seem to
>indicate that Formac Devideon might be a good choice. What are the
>experiences of this burner? Is the bundled Formac software adequate
>or should I buy Roxio Toast Titanium?
>
>Mikael
>--
>Mikael Grounes
>Kvarnvillan
>S-64060 Åkers Styckebruk
>Sweden
>
>Tel. intern.: *46-159-34591
>      nat.   : 0159-34591

-- 
---------------------------------
Rod Duncan

"Buy a Mac and be thought a fool
or buy a Windows box and remove all doubt."