DVD was originally short for Digital Video Disc as DVDs were first used for storing and distributing movies and video. DVDs are now also commonly known as Digital Versatile Discs, this due to the fact that they are now used for more than just storing movies. DVDR stands for “DVD Recordable” and DVDRW for “DVD ReWriteable”. If you are familiar with regular audio/music CDs or regular DVD-Video discs, then you will know what a recordable DVD looks like. A recordable DVD stores up to 2 hours of very good quality DVD-Video and audio tracks in formats such as stereo, Dolby Digital or DTS. The video and audio is often accessed from an advanced menu system that is also stored on the DVD. If you choose to lower the video quality it is possible to store several hours of video on a recordable DVD using lower bitrates and lower resolution with video quality similar to VHS.

A DVD can store up to 4.7GB on a single layer disc and 8.5GB on a dual layer disc. Double-sided dual layer DVDs can hold 17GB of data. A dual layer DVD differs from a single layer disc in that it has one surface layer that can be read from and written to and a second deeper layer than can also be read from and written to.

There are three competing DVD Recording standards, DVD-R/DVD-RW and DVD+R/DVD+RW. These standards have pretty similar features and are compatible with many stand alone DVD Players and most DVD-ROMs. DVD-RAM has less DVD-ROM compatability but has better recording features.