Microboards has a publishing solution for bands, churches or any organization that needs an easy-to-use machine to burn and print CD and DVD discs.

From Microboards site:

Four Easy Steps to Creating Professional, Finished Discs

1. Design your label. Use included templates for easy design or import from Photoshop®.

2. Choose your recording files. Make audio discs, burn multimedia content, distribute software, or archive data.

3. Set the quantity desired. Also access advanced features through the intuitive software interface.

4. Walk away! Let the 50-disc input, reliable robotics, integrated inkjet printer, and high-speed recorder do the rest!

Words and pictures are great but to see the machine in action watch the video.

The GX-1 is compatible with PC and Mac.  For more product info please visit our GX-1 page. 

Avastor hard drives are favorites of Encore Data Products pro A/V customers.  The company has become a global supplier for people recording music, editing for film and more. 

I spoke with Avastor, Inc. co-founder Richard Wilson the other day about their company...here is what I found out:

1. What is your background that led you to start a pro A/V drive company?
I started way back in 1979 working for Texas Instruments (in the oil exploration business), using mainframe computers and one inch and half inch computer tape!   In 1987 I joined 3M handling the UK pro audio/video tape business.   Hard drives are now the new tape-certainly for audio.   It was time to produce a hard drive product designed for professional applications.

2. What are the biggest changes you've seen in the last 5 years in music recording?
The smaller demand for analog tape and the move to affordable digital workstations that are easy to use.

3. Any predictions on the next 5 years?
Higher sampling rates and bit depth to provide content for DVD-HD and Blu-Ray DVD.

4. Why go with Avastor over a drive you can find on the shelf of your  local computer big box store?
As stated previously, it was time to introduce a robust external hard drive, which could handle the rigors of editing- as well as stream large track counts of high resolution audio and video.  All our drives are 100% speed tested, fan cooled and come in a robust LockBox – ideal for shipping and storing.  Consumer drives simply do not offer this protection and performance for your valuable masters.

5. Any new products on the horizon?
We have some new RAID products – as well as other storage solutions coming.

Encore Data Products is offering a FREE Avastor T-Shirt with every Avastor drive order...while supplies last. 

In our corner of the world blank recordable Blu-ray discs outsell HD-DVD. There are more brand choices and greater capacities; you can fit quite a bit on a 50GB disc.  Both camps have strong supporters so time will tell how each will do.

Articles about the two formats often bring up the old "VHS vs. Beta" comparison.  CNET has a Blu-ray, HD-DVD and DVD comparison page which is a good source for the basics.  Other information sources include the Official HD-DVD site and The Blu-ray Disc Association.  

There was an announcement this week about a Blu-ray format change that will affect the early adopters of the format.  Earlier machines won't be able to use additional features that will be found on upcoming releases.

For users of blank recordable media upcoming products include printable discs; we have heard Imation and TDK have released product but our suppliers do not have anything available yet.  We just added two Blu-ray Pro duplication systems by Microboards Technology; for specs click here.

For our blog visitors: We are running a store-wide 10% off sale!  Save 10% on any IN STOCK item  order over $150.  Use coupon code 2DAY10 when checking out.  As always ground shipping is free to the lower 48...

Save big on gold media, tape, drives and more.  Coupon expires at midnight April 10th. 

Thanks for visiting our blog...check back for upcoming product reviews, news and customer spotlights.   

MAM-A Mitsui, Kodak, Delkin and Verbatim all offer gold media products.  We respond to a lot of questions about the differences between brands and grades of discs.  Here are a few we see often: 

Gold and Archival Gold...what is the difference?:   MAM-A Mitsui produces both gold and archival grade gold media on the same production lines. While all of their gold media exceeds the specs for gold discs, the archival grade media consists of the discs with the highest test ratings.

How should I store my discs? Discs should be stored vertically in a protective case. Standard Jewel Cases are fine. MAM-A has a technical papers section on their site; one report discusses storage and handling of DVD and CD media.

Writing on MAM-A discs: It is recommended that only water-based, felt-tipped markers be used on the surface of a CD-R. For DVD-R, any type of marker can be used, since the data is protected by a plastic layer on the top surface. Solvent based pens can be harmful to the data layer of the disc.

Branded or Unbranded? A "Branded" disc is also known as a "logo" disc. This means the company information is printed on the top surface. An "unbranded" or "no logo" disc has a top surface without writing. Usually there is some sort of identifying info in the inner hub on all discs. The bottom of the discs are not affected by being branded or unbranded.

Which is better...DVD-R or DVD+R? You will find both versions have fans.  To see what MAM-A has to say click Click HERE

Our first shipment of inkjet printable blu-ray discs is finally coming in.  Imation has one product, part number 26649, which is a 25GB BD-R disc with a white inkjet printable surface.  These are packaged in jewel cases.

The Imation disc was announced back in February and includes the water-resistant AquaGuard technology.  I'm sure more brands will have product announcements in the very near future.

I want to mention a favorite music magazine of mine:  Tape Op magazine.  For those of you who are not familiar with it definitely check it out.  There are always excellent articles on recording, studios, gear and people in the music business.  As a person who has played in bands over the years but never studied the fine points of recording I can still enjoy reading about how a certain band/producer/engineer managed to come up with a certain sound.  It is a print magazine but there are many more articles, resources and even a message board on their website.

We run a small ad in Tape Op for our RMGI analog tape, Avastor and Glyph hard drives since a lot of our clients are the folks who record music for a living.  I'm sure the mag appeals to music fans as well since well-known artists and producers are often featured.  Making an "album" can be a pretty involved process so naturally some great stories are created along with the music.  

Odds are if you are involved with music you already subscribe to Tape Op...if not it is time to start reading.  

Since Encore Data Products does most business online our web store had to work well, be user-friendly, have a decent look and most importantly leave customers wanting to return.   we shopped around prior to partnering with a firm to build our online store in 2006.  After checking out various store software versions and companies who created stores we ended up going with Ryan Design Studio.

 The result exceeded our expectations and the store looks great.  I spoke with Padraic Ryan, founder of Ryan Design Studio, to get a little information on their company and find out what makes them successful:

 Tell us a little about Ryan Design Studio 

 I formed Ryan Design Studio back in 2003 as an Architecture and Web Development firm. Architecture and Web Design may sound like two totally unrelated fields, but from a design perspective they are essentially the same thing: solving a problem using design. While the housing market slowed here in the Northeast, the e-commerce market was growing at an exponential rate, so we decided to drop Architecture all together and focus solely on e-commerce and other web development projects.

 Originally Ryan Design Studio was only myself, but I now have two graphic designers and two programmers who I partner with on most projects. This not only keeps our designs fresh and different, but also allows me to give our clients the one on one support that they have grown accustomed to.

Why did you end up focusing on X-Cart store software over some other choices?

 When we were developing our first e-commerce store back in the early 90s, we had to essentially build our own shopping cart system using a programming language called CGI. Over the years, there have been more and more companies who offer pre-made systems, and we have tried most of them. We finally settled on X-Cart mainly due to their extremely flexible system and the extensive development community that has grown up around it. There are literally hundreds of add-on modules available, and most importantly, the code allows us to integrate any look we want into the template system. We have found it to be a great platform.

Does your company offer services other than X-Cart design?

We originally offered Architectural services as well as web development, but have since dropped our Architectural practice. We specialize mainly in e-commerce sites built with X-Cart, but also build 'brochure' type sites for businesses who are just looking for a web presence or on-line portfolio of projects. We also run our own hosting service that is geared primarily for our X-Cart clients.

If you are looking for a company to get your business online we recommend Ryan Design Studio; for more information you can contact them here.   

Prior to starting Encore Data Products I used to co-own a tape supply company in Burbank, CA. The company started out as a 3M distributor moving a lot of 3M 996 open reel tape. Soon after Ampex signed us up and then BASF. A decent-sized recording project would use 20-50 reels of 2"  tape and often more. Since tape is now about $225 per reel of 2" x 2500' I dug back to see what it cost about 10 years ago....somewhere in the neighborhood of $125 depending on which version you went with. While researching I found a studio price sheet for Mitch Easter's Drive-In Recording Studio from 1980.  Tape at that studio in 1980 was $110 per reel.  Costs have doubled but since demand has dropped considerably I guess $225 is not too bad for "that great analog sound".

Mitch Easter is one of those great musician/producer/engineer guys who fronted an excellent band Lets Active.

One of the best shows I've ever seen was at the late, great 688 club in Atlanta, GA that Let's Active headlined.  After not letting anyone in until very late due to sound check issues (if I remember correctly) we finally saw them go on about 1 in the morning.  Definitely worth the wait.

I have never met Mitch but he always seemed like the kind of person you would want to be in a band with.  He has a new CD out now you can order here. 

One of the newer tape storage options on the market is Sun StorageTek T10000 (T10K) tape. With an uncompressed capacity of 500GB this format is very popular with large data centers who require a reliable, fast and high capacity tape media.  Product specs can be seen on the StorageTek site.

From the Sun/Storagetek site:  "The Sun StorageTek™ T10000 tape cartridge, which works in tandem with the Sun StorageTek T10000 tape drive, addresses issues related to data growth, security, manageability, and cost. With 500-gigabyte capacity, the T10000 tape cartridge stores more data in the same footprint. And with 2:1 compression, it can store up to one terabyte of data to help you meet growing data storage requirements. Ultra-high capacity makes the T10000 tape cartridge ideal for high-volume backup, archiving, and disaster recovery applications.

The T10000 tape cartridge also increases data security with the Sun StorageTek T10000 SafeGuide™ system, in which a unique hub lock stabilizes media within the cartridge shell."

Please call us at 866-926-1669 or email us at sales@encoredaproducts.com if you would like more information or would like to discuss volume pricing. 

It looks like Imation is acquiring TDK's global recording media business. From what I have read there will still be TDK branded product on the market but it will now be manufactured by Imation.

TDK still makes audio products as well as data media; it will be interesting to see if all the lines make the final cut. 

I wanted to let everyone know we just started an INCREDIBLE promotion on our top-selling Gold media products. We picked one item from our 3 categories: Gold CD-R, Gold DVD-R and Gold DVD+R discs. Our prices are always competitive but now you can save an extra 10% on these items when your total is $150 or more. As always ground shipping is free so your savings can be huge.

MAM-A Mitsui is the industry leader in gold archival media.  With DVD media having a life expectancy of 100+ years and the CD-R 300+ years gold is the way to go for your long-term storage projects.

Professional photographers, government agencies, hospitals and more use MAM-A gold media for their critical storage applications.  

MAM-A offers multiple pages of information on manufacturing processes, technical reports and more at www.mam-a.com .

I have spoken with a lot of people this week wondering about their Glyph drives. I'm very happy to report we have product moving out again; all the Glyph GT Series 051, 050 Quad, and 062 RAID drives are shipping. The only back orders we currently face are for the GT keys...this has been a tough one over the past few months.  It looks like in a month all product lines will be at 100%.  The staff at Glyph are all working hard to keep us "in stock".  

Glyph is currently offering a wide selection of hard drive storage for professional A/V users.  The new GT062 series is a dual drive product which supports RAID 0 and has FireWire 400, FireWire 800 and USB 2.0 ports.  For you eSATA customers the GT 050Q Quad series offers FireWire 400, FireWire 800, USB 2.0 AND eSATA ports.  Capacity goes up to 750GB.

 New Glyph products for us this week include a pro CD/DVD Burner and a 1-to-1 media duplicator.  Please give us a call  (866-926-1669) if you would like to discuss your upcoming hard drive needs. 

The Encore Data Products blog is still very new and very much a spec in the world of blogs.  My goal is to provide some useful information to our readers and generate some interest in the company from people who might not know about us.  Here are some basics on the company:

Brands we sell:  Altec Lansing, Avastor, Buffalo Technology, Certance, Delkin Devices, Emtec, Exabyte, Fuji Film, Glyph, G-Tech, HP, IBM, Imation, Iomega, Kodak, Lacie, MAM-A Mitsui, M Audio, Maxell, Maxoptix, Maxtor, Memorex, Microboards Technology, Neat Receipts, Panasonic, Permastore Turtle Case, Philips, Pioneer, Plasmon, Primera, ProAvio, Quantum, Rimage, RMG, Samsung, Sandisk, Sennheiser, Sling Media, Sony, Sun Storagetek, Taiyo Yuden, Tandberg Data, TDK, TEAC, Telex, Toshiba, Verbatim, Western Digital and Xerox.  I think that is everybody...

Our products include:  Archival gold CD-R DVD-R DVD+R,  hard drives, medical grade media, LTO, DLT, AIT, T10K tape, storage, pro audio, blu-ray, HD DVD, data tape, DVD media, CD-R to name a few. 

Our Customers cover a variety of markets.  The pro audio & video folks use us for hard drives, media and RMG analog open reel tape.  Hospitals and medical offices need archival media, medical grade discs and backup tape.  We just added the TDK Medical line of DICOM Media Creator Systems. 

Everybody these days uses some sort of backup computer media.  our professional photography clients love the gold archival CD & DVD discs; some of these folks find us through our little ad on The Online Photographer blog by Mike Johnston.  Tons of great photography info on that site! 

From a police station in rural Texas to a university in New York....everyone has something to back up and we try hard to have the best items available.  From our office in Louisville, CO (Money Magazine's #5 best place to live in 2005!) we get most orders out same-day and offer prompt delivery with multiple warehouses all over the U.S.

We are now offering international shipping on some products to many countries.  Please visit our International Order info page for more information.

Free shipping and no minimums???  Yes!  We are glad to offer free shipping within the United States (except AK & HI) and have no minimum order amounts.  There are some products that have a starting quantity for ordering but most can be ordered in singles.  We collect sales tax for orders shipped in Colorado.

Specials:  We run a lot of promotions both in the store and through our email list.  If you would like to receive all our promos be sure to sign up on our front page.  We don't send out emails every day but try to get some specials going at least twice a month.  Our monthly email newsletter often has extra coupons as well.

That's enough for now.  I hope if Encore Data Products is new to you you'll check us out; we would love to be your supplier of choice!