I can burn all my Verbatim 8x DVD+R and TYG02 8x DVD-R at 12x but I don't see the point of 12x over 8x or any speed over 8x because it makes next to no difference at all.

I burnt a Verbatim 8x DVD+R at 12x and it saved me a only about 47 seconds. It burned very well at 12x but it also burns fine at 8x.

16x will save only about 2 minutes over 8x.

Is there any point to burning faster than 8x? What's your opinions?

8x = 8 mins 17 seconds
12x =7 mins 30 seconds

Not really. If 8x works well for you and you are happy, I'd just stick with 8x.

I can burn my Verbatim 16x DVD-R's at 16x, but I don't do it for speed.

My computer spends a lot more time waiting for me than I do for it, so...

Except when I'm experimenting, I burn most of my DVD media at 8x or even 6x on the drives that are capable of 6x burning, because my tests show that burning at 6x/8x is nearly always better when all things are considered (jitter and PIE/PIF scans in multiple drives).

Since I always verify a burn and perform a scan, the added time it takes to burn at 6x/8x is negligible IMO compared to the time saved in reburning and retesting the occasional disc that turns out unacceptable when burned at 12x or faster.

There are so few combinations of media/drive/firmware that burn better at 12x or faster compared to 6x/8x in my experience, that I consider 6x/8x to be the safest speed overall for any 8x or 16x rated media.

For 8x rated media I cannot think of a single example where I got better results at 12x than I did at 8x or 6x in any drive.

I'm not saying that there aren't any exceptions, but they are few and far between in my experience.

i agree with dragemester... i prefer burning 16x rated discs @ 8x as the results are ALWAYS good for me ... disc quality tests show that 8x burning is (on my memorex CMC MAG M01) WAY better than 16x burning is on my drive.... disc quality score = 0 @ 16x burning... vs a score of 95 (no worse than 93) @ 8x on average.

i have a lite-on 1673S drive with JS0D firmware (modified a little bit)

so the bottom line between the "8X or 12X" question ... i would definately choose 8x overall on average in the long run

I think it depends on media/drive/firmware combination.
The OP asks about burning certified 8X media @12X or 8X , in that case 8X or even 6X is better than burning @ 12X .
For 16X media (in my case Sony MIJ D21 and TYG03) I find 12X burning gives way better results than 16X or 8X .

I've seen cases where MCC003 and YUDEN000T02 burned just as well at 12x as 8x with my PX-712A.

Yup, I get great results at 12x on TYG02 with my 111D. That being said you are right that there is precious little in the difference of burning times. I did a 16x burn with a 16x DVD-R Verb and it completed it in about 6 minutes. It burned fine but I will probably stick to 8x or 12x burns from now on, doesn't seem much point in doing anything else. That being said I tried a 6x burn on a couple of those 16x Verbs (more by accident than anything else) and it did precious little for difference in error rate scans.