Data BD-XL 100 GB, UDF 2.50 or 2.60?

[Sebaz]

I'm getting ready to burn my first BD-XL ever, filled with music albums I bought online for the past two years, and I want to maximize the chances that it will be read by my 4K Blu-ray players. I can't find anywhere if BD-XLs are supposed to be 2.50 or 2.60. Does anyone here know?

[dbminter]

It shouldn't matter.  The file system type is generally independent of the media size when it comes to optical discs.  (Older file system types, though, generally ARE, but should not be here with UDF 2.50 and 2.60.)  However, I would recommend the 2.50 if your primary concern is getting these MP3's/whatever container format to be recognized on a standalone Blu-Ray player.  Using the older one should be more compatible universally with hardware.

[Sebaz]

Thanks. Well, actually, I was hoping against hope it could be read by my 4K Blu-ray players, but not a single one, not even the Oppo UDP-203, which is a champ at reading all kinds of formats. Seems weird, since 4K Blu-rays are actually BD-XLs with 100 GB, even if they don't get to that amount of space. So in theory they should be able to read them, but I guess the manufacturers didn't care much.

[dbminter]

Well, it may be dependent on what you're trying to do.  You mentioned putting audio content on these discs.  Were you attempting to put MP3's or other audio container files on these discs and expect to play them natively from the BD-R XL disc in your player?  If so, your player may not natively support playing MP3's from optical discs.  It may only play them from flash drives.

[Sebaz]

13 minutes ago, dbminter said:

Well, it may be dependent on what you're trying to do.  You mentioned putting audio content on these discs.  Were you attempting to put MP3's or other audio container files on these discs and expect to play them natively from the BD-R XL disc in your player?  If so, your player may not natively support playing MP3's from optical discs.  It may only play them from flash drives.

Not MP3s, just FLACs. But I know the players support the format (maybe the Panasonic doesn't, I can't remember but it's the most finicky when it comes to formats), as I have burned data BD-Rs and BD-R DL with albums in FLAC Hi-Res and they work just fine. 

In the case of the BD-XL, my Oppo, Sony and Panasonic players just don't even read the disc, all of them give me an error.

[dbminter]

I've never tried burning any BD-R XL discs with anything on them, so I don't know if my LG 4K Blu-Ray player would playback FLAC from it.  I know my LG will play them from a flash drive as I've done that before.  I don't know if it supports playing audio containers from optical discs, though.

[Sebaz]

5 minutes ago, dbminter said:

I've never tried burning any BD-R XL discs with anything on them, so I don't know if my LG 4K Blu-Ray player would playback FLAC from it.  I know my LG will play them from a flash drive as I've done that before.  I don't know if it supports playing audio containers from optical discs, though.

It probably does, but not from a BD-XL. That's what I gather from all the reading I've done on several forums, that there's only one player that plays data BD-XLs and it's a Panasonic that is sold only in Japan and is super expensive. You know how it is, the Japanese always have the best electronics in the world.

[ultramegaburningenthiseist]

On 6/5/2025 at 5:28 PM, Sebaz said:

Not MP3s, just FLACs. But I know the players support the format (maybe the Panasonic doesn't, I can't remember but it's the most finicky when it comes to formats), as I have burned data BD-Rs and BD-R DL with albums in FLAC Hi-Res and they work just fine. 

In the case of the BD-XL, my Oppo, Sony and Panasonic players just don't even read the disc, all of them give me an error.

why cant you just burn into a cd-r instead? it should still give you about 80 minutes independent from file size (it would compress into cd-quality audio (44.1khz 16bit)).

[Sebaz]

19 hours ago, ultramegaburningenthiseist said:

why cant you just burn into a cd-r instead? it should still give you about 80 minutes independent from file size (it would compress into cd-quality audio (44.1khz 16bit)).

Because I spent good money in buying albums in Hi-Res, some of which go up to 24-96 and some 24-192. Seems foolish to take away a lot of audio information just to put them on a CD that will contain a single album, when a BD-XL can contain hundreds of them. Even a BD-RL can contain over a hundred albums in FLAC.

[dbminter]

You may want to investigate if your 4k Blu-Ray players support playing these albums from a flash drive.  If there's a USB port on the player and the unit supports reading large enough flash drives, you could get a 128 GB or 256 GB one and it would do the same job as the BD disc.  In fact, the flash drive would have more room.

 

My LG Blu-Ray player supports MP3, FLAC, AAC, and other formats and it reads in from my 1 TB flash drive.  So, I could probably store my entire CD collection as lossless containers on that thing.

[Sebaz]

9 minutes ago, dbminter said:

You may want to investigate if your 4k Blu-Ray players support playing these albums from a flash drive.  If there's a USB port on the player and the unit supports reading large enough flash drives, you could get a 128 GB or 256 GB one and it would do the same job as the BD disc.  In fact, the flash drive would have more room.

 

My LG Blu-Ray player supports MP3, FLAC, AAC, and other formats and it reads in from my 1 TB flash drive.  So, I could probably store my entire CD collection as lossless containers on that thing.

I know. I have a 1 TB drive connected to my router, and I play from it in most of my devices. But I like to have things on optical discs too. When compared to a CD, a BD-R DL can store hundreds of albums, even in Hi-Res, so even if 50 GB is nowhere near 1 TB, it's still a lot of music in one disc. 

[dbminter]

But it doesn't matter if the player doesn't natively support playing the files from an optical disc like it might from a flash drive.    However, as you say, I like having optical disc archives, too.  So, you could put these albums on BD-R XL discs as well as on flash drives.

[Sebaz]

1 hour ago, dbminter said:

But it doesn't matter if the player doesn't natively support playing the files from an optical disc like it might from a flash drive.    However, as you say, I like having optical disc archives, too.  So, you could put these albums on BD-R XL discs as well as on flash drives.

Well, 4K Blu-ray players do just fine with BD-R DL discs. In fact, I burned one today filled up to 99% according to ImgBurn and my players read it and play it just fine. The thing about flash drives, SSDs, hard drives, etc, is that one screw-up and everything gets deleted. Well, with hard drives, you just take it for granted that one day it's not going to work anymore. But they are all erasable. 

With BD-Rs, as long as it's Verbatim and not Memorex or some other crappy brand, you know that it's going to last several years, and it can't be erased accidentally. So I know that ten years from now, that disc I burned today will still work just fine. Also, BD-Rs have a coating against accidental scratches.