Re-using mini DV tapes

[crzy4dsny]

Can you re-use a mini dv tape or will you lose quality ?

 

[Delphis]

I've never been able to find any solid hard proof online that if you use it multiple times that you'll lose quality. Some people say they use them over and over again and see no difference. I personally never use them over again, they're too cheap online to have to worry about it. I can buy double the amount of tapes, + pay shipping and still come out cheaper than the price in physical stores for multi-packs.

 

[boBQuincy]

It depends. After dragging a piece of tape over a rotating head enough times, some loss is bound to occur. Reusing a tape once or twice is not likely to be noticeable.
Erasing the tape with a bulk eraser before reuse is probably a good idea.

I use few enough tapes that I just buy new ones instead of erasing them.

 

[RitchG]

It's usually OK to re-use a MiniDV tape several times. IN the olden days, when the signal depended primarily on the amount of magnetism in the tape, every time you passed the tape over the heads you lost some of that magentic capacity. With digital, it's not as direct relationship; you can loose a bit more of the tape coating and the electronics can still recreate a good image.

BUT, I (nearly) never reuse tapes; for the same reason as Delphis and boBQuincy; MiniDV tape is a very inexpensive storage container (less expensive than storing the digitized video on a hard drive, usually). Also, (with my memory these days) I'd rather make it standard procedure to use a new tape each time and avoid the possibility of recording over something important; probably something that I haven't captured to disc yet.
---Ritch

 

[MarkBarbieri]

You won't lose any quality except when you do. That is, the picture will be identical most of the time, but you'll probably get more drop-outs. I agree with the others - tape is cheap. Just use new stuff.

 

[jfulcer]

You can reuse them a few times, but after about 4-5 you will have to toss the tape. You will begin to get all kinds of artifacts an noise in your picture. Once you get to that point, the tape is useless.

I wouldn't recommend re-using a tape more than once. Think of the tapes as the backup of your memories. Those tapes will most likely last longer than a burned CD/DVD. So hold on to the tapes so that when the DVDs fail you can still make another copy.