DVD Will Not Play!

[cnl390]

I burned a project onto DVD and have found that it will play in my DVD burner and ine of my two DVD players at home. It will not work in my sister in law's or my son's DVD player. Here are the specs....
My system is
Dell Computer
Pentium 4
2.4 MHz
768 RAM
Maxtor harddrive
Rage video
Creative sound card

Capture devise...
ADS USB 2.0

DVD burner...
LG 2166 Dual layer

I used Capwiz to capture from VHS tape.

Project specs...
NTSC DVD
MPEG-2 Video, Upper field first
24 bits, 720 x 480 4.3
Variable 3998 (also burned one at 8000)
Audio MPEG Audio Layer 2 Files (burned another at the other setting NPCL or something like that)
224 kbps

[PeterMilliken]

You don't mention what format DVD you are writing i.e. is it +R, -R or dual layer?

For example, my father has a Panasonic DVD Recorder which only accepts/plays -R format discs, so I can't give him videos that I record on +R format discs.

Also, some DVD players (I am not sure this is true of DVD players these days though) used to be somewhat tempramental about playing -R discs.

There is a web-site somewhere (a URL has been posted here to this forum many times) that lists DVD player characteristics - so if you know the manufacturer/model # you can check out the specs on your DVD players.

Hope this helps,
Peter

[Ken Berry]

Welcome to the wonderful world of home-made DVDs!! If you do a search of this or any other similar forum, you will find loads of stories similar to yours.

The fact is that not all stand-alone DVD players will play all home-made DVDs (and are likely to be even more finicky about home-made VCDs, let alone SVCDs). Moreover, there is a lot of evidence to indicate that many of the more expensive, brand-name stand-alone players are amongst the more difficult in this regard. Some will simply refuse to recognise the disc: "No Disc" messages... Some may play the video but not the audio or vice versa. And some may play the disc erratically, in fits and starts.

There is also a lot of evidence that some players work better with specific types and brands of discs (or brands that are made in a particular factory, since a lot of the big disc brands are in fact produced in a variety of factories by different sub-contractors). Some prefer +R; some prefer -R; some don't like + or - RW discs. And other facts like the speed of the burn will also affect the ultimate playability of your home masterpiece.

I personally regard the latter as being a particularly significant factor. Too many people take the disc at its word: if it says it will burn at 16x, then they burn it at 16x. Even though I use these faster discs, I personally never burn a DVD at more than 4x. It seems to me that the slower the burning speed, the greater the possibility of the signal being 'embedded' more 'firmly' into the disc, thus improving its readability by a wider variety of player lasers. And also at least helping to minimise any of the other factors which might make one player less likely to play a particular disc than another...

[cnl390]

I guess I left out two important facts.
I burned them on Verbatim DVD+R DL @ 2.4X

I guess my best bet is to burn projects in both formats from now on.

[Ken Berry]

You can find the very extensive list that Peter referred to at http://www.videohelp.com/dvdplayers

[PeterMilliken]

I am not sure just how successful DL discs/recording has been - I haven't tried it myself despite having two Dual Layer burners

As a start, my suggestion is to burn a very small project to a -R disc - this is supposedly the "most compatible format" for DVD players. Once again, as Ken mentions, the "more expensive" DVD players can tend to be quite parochial in their choice of prefered format disc - as I mentioned with the reference to the Panasonic DVD recorder. So you'll have to keep that factor in mind i.e. a brief piece of research with the players manuals might turn up something.

So a "quick" trial with first a -R and then perhaps a +R disc (both single layer of course) might help determine what you can and cannot reliably use on the range of DVD players you wish to produce DVD's for. Once you have worked out the limitations under which you are working then you should be able to start rolling videos off the production line

Best of luck,
Peter

[harperv]

definitely one of the most frustrating aspects of burning dvds.
my son and his wife (parents of our beloved grandsons) have a dvd player (expensive but a couple of years old now) which refuses to accept my dvds. their machine says it takes -Rs but still just says no disc.
add to this that my son not a computor whiz cant get sound on his PC I am now travelling with my lap top to enable playing of my slide shows and movies for the boys to see.

[GeorgeW]

Did you Author a DVD, or did you just burn the captured mpeg files to your Disc?

If Authored, what software did you use to do the authoring?

Regards,
George

[tyamada]

You might want to use this link to determine if your DVDs will play on certian stand alone players.

http://www.videohelp.com/dvdplayers

[PeterMilliken]

Of course the ultimate solution to all of this is the old standby - purchase one of the dirt cheap ($55 Australian) DVD players from China - they play everything in my experience