Help solve DVD Slow Burn Rate.?

Question

I backup my Avi files from my External Drive to DVD. Although the target Max burn speed that the software detects is 8X, the actual burn rate is always between 3.1-3.5X. It takes about 35 mins to burn a DVD. Is my PC the bottleneck? What are ways to improve this if you don't think my PC is the bottleneck?
I have another burner (nonSony) and it's burning the same slow rate. Please help.
Thanks a lot.
My system:
DVD Burner: Sony DRU-120C Burn Rate 16X both +- DVD Disk
DVD Disk: Verbatim tried both + and - 8X and 16X
PC: Pentium 3: 800 Mhz (I know it's old)
Software: Roxio Creator 8

Answer 1

Your computer is definitely the source of the bottleneck. In your case the CPU speed is the most important factor determining the write speed. The second factor is the amount of RAM you have installed. When you burn a DVD, the files on your external hard drive are copied in to memory and then record on to the DVD blank You can speed things up by exiting all open programs before burning. This frees up both CPU cycles and memory. That's the easy part. Other things you can do is increase your virtual memory and overclock your CPU - not easy. If you want to try these 2 last items, drop me an e-mail and I can provide some good articles with instructions.

Answer 2

Its probably not your PC, though it might be.

Its your external drive. The data comes from the drive to your computer, which has a slow processor, through a USB connection, and then it gets burned.

Try copying the data to your internal hard disk, in a partition that has a lot of free space, preferably, and then burn it.