After dubbing your VHS tape to DVD on your Magnavox DVD recorder you will see a message like the message above about remembering to finalize your DVD disc.
If you’re like me you don’t find it very intuitive how to finalize a disc on a Magnavox DVD recorder, so here’s how to do it:
Make sure your DVD disc is inserted, then using the remote control press the SETUP button, then use the up/down arrows and select DISC EDIT from the menu options, then up/down arrows to select FINALIZE, then up/down arrows to select YES. Finalizing can take several minutes, the longer the DVD the longer it takes to finalize.
Depending on what step you are in of the VHS to DVD recording process it may vary how you get to the first menu option to finalize your disc. We’ll explain in full detail with pictures in this article.
Step By Step Disc Finalize Instructions with Pictures
The following steps to finalizing a disc should work for most Magnavox DVD Recorders.
1. Make sure you are not on the playback chapter menu screen
After you transfer/dubbed footage from your VHS tape to your DVD via the dubbing process the playback chapter menu screen will appear when you’ve hit [STOP] to finish the dubbing session.
Each time you’ve started and stop the dubbing process the new footage will show as an additional DVD chapter added like below:
If you find yourself on a screen like this it means you are in playback mode of the DVD and landed on the Main Menu when you go to play your DVD.
These are the menu options as they are created using your Magnavox DVD Recorder, these can be edited so each chapter name can be changed or even chapters deleted, but that is a story for another day.
If you clicked [OK] on the selected chapter the DVD would start playing that chapter.
You need to get out of playback mode before you can finalize the disc.
In order to do that hit [STOP] on the DVD side of the player or on the remote. At this point, the screen should now look blank as there is no VHS or DVD playing.
2. Press the SETUP button on the remote control
By pressing the [SETUP] button the Setup Menu should appear like below:
3. Navigate to Disc Edit option
Now that you are in the Setup menu, navigate down to the Disc Edit option using the down arrows on the remote, then click [OK]. This will bring you to the Disc Edit menu.
4. Select ‘Finalize’ option
Once you are on the Disc Edit menu use the arrows on your remote to navigate to the Finalize option then click [OK]
5. Confirm Finalize Disc
When you clicked [OK] on the Finalize option a confirmation pop-up will appear – navigate up and click [Yes]
6. Wait for Finalization Process to Complete
Once you’ve confirmed that you want to finalize the disc the process will begin. A progress screen will appear once it starts.
I have used these steps with my own Magnavox DVD recorder and researched the user manuals for all of the models below and these steps should work the same.
- ZV427MG9
- ZC352MW8
- ZV450MW8
- MWR10D6
If you have a different model try these same steps if you have the same buttons on your remote.
Frequently Asked Questions:
Do you still have questions about finalizing your disc? We have answers!
How Long Does it take to Finalize a Disc?
While experimenting with a test disc with only a few minutes of footage on it the finalize process still took 10 minutes.
Finalizing a full DVD disc can take a full hour or more.
Why you need to finalize your DVD discs
It may not make sense that you have to finalize your DVD after recording it, after all, isn’t all of the information you need already on the disc?
The “problem” lies in that your DVD recorder, be it Magnavox, Sony, or any other brand generally has some editing capabilities that allow you to customize the disk.
For example, you can edit things like the disc name, the location of chapters on the disc, the chapter names, and various other types of information.
That information that you are editing is generally only understood by the manufacturer while in its “raw” / unfinalized state. This means you can come back and continually change your edits.
The step of finalizing your disk makes all of your edits compatible with other DVD players
This means those edits are no longer editable, i.e., those edits are final.
Do you have to finalize a disc?
You don’t have to finalize a disc, but it’s better if you do – just like eating vegetables…
It is likely that the disc may play in other players, although many times I have tried to play the disc on my computer after forgetting to finalize and the disks were unreadable.
Do yourself a favor and finalize your disks.
How to Auto-Finalize Your Disks
Is is possible to Un-Finalize a Disc?
Some DVD recorders will let you un-finalize a disc, generally, this may be possible if you are recording using a DVD-RW disc, which stands for read/write disc.
Rewritable discs act more like a USB hard drive than a regular DVD disc in that information can be erased or overwritten.
How to Finalize a disc on Magnavox DVD Recorder Without The Original Remote
If you have a Magnavox DVD Recorder but have lost the original remote you may not know how to finalize the disc.
It turns out you can use a universal remote to finalize a disc on a Magnavox DVD recorder using the following steps.
- Make sure the disc is inserted in the recorder
- Make sure you are out of playback mode – just like above if you see a screen with chapters on it you are in playback mode – hit [STOP]
- On the universal remote hit [ENTER] and this should bring you to the Disc Menu, from there its the same instructions as above
- Using the up/down arrows select [Disc Edit] option
- Using the up/down arrows select [FINALIZE]
- Using the up/down arrows select [YES] then hit [ENTER]
Here’s a video explanation of this:
Conclusion
Finalizing your DVD disc isn’t difficult, remembering the steps is so keep this article handy.
Here’s a YouTube video showing how to finalize a disc on a Magnavox DVD recorder