Stand alone recorders; more of a problem than PC recorders?

[videobruce]

I have two Magnavox/Funai H2160MW9 DVR/DVD recorders and the discs I have burned have playback problems on my Oppo 970HD DVD player and the two different optical drives in my PC. One recorder is the original version, the other is the newer 'A' version.

On the Oppo, the playback studders, but interestingly, if I pause or stop playback and resume, the studdering usually goes away. This happens on multiple discs, anywhere on the disc and at anytime. Sometimes the video plays correctly the first time, if not, I can usually 'fix' the problem by stopping and restarting playback. Sometimes it takes two or three tries to get it to work.

All of the material that was burned came off the HDD from S-VHS transfers. I also tried a time shift recording off of 'cable', but the problem is still there (at least during PC playback).
Per recommendations, the last media I have tried were T-Y and RiData 8x -R's. Previously, I was using TDK, but there is no improvement.

I understand these stand alone DVD recorders, unlike optical recorders in PCs' have record issues. This is my 1st stand alone DVD recorder. I have burned well over 150 DVDs' in a PC with little issues.

Now what?

[hech54]

I'd rip the disc to your computer HDD and run it through FixVTS. FixVTS was originally designed to fix errors created by DVD Recorder discs.

[videobruce]

That doesn't solve the problem. The material I have to transfer is on the HDD of the 2160. It's not one disc, it's everything recorded on this 2160.

Elsewhere it was stated, it's a problem with all/many stand alone DVD recorders.

[hech54]

That doesn't solve the problem. The material I have to transfer is on the HDD of the 2160. It's not one disc, it's everything recorded on this 2160.

Elsewhere it was stated, it's a problem with all/many stand alone DVD recorders.

What else is there to do? If your recorder is messing up the file structure of the discs it creates
(a common problem actually)....what are your options? You obviously have at least one of the
DVD Recorder discs that are proven to studder in players.....testing my theory will find the problem.
Unless of course you know how to write new and improved firmware and install it in your DVD Recorder.

[lordsmurf]

Per recommendations, the last media I have tried were T-Y and RiData 8x -R's. Previously, I was using TDK, but there is no improvement.

Try Verbatim DVD+R. If that doesn't work, then it's not a media issue.
Ritek (Ridata) and CMC (TDK) are inferior discs, unreliable.
TY should be good, but they're still not as compatible as the Mitsubishi (Verbatim) media.

Open up the recorder, and see what DVD burner is inside. There is usually some kind of marking on it.

[videobruce]

I thought RiData was recommended. Something changed in the past couple of years?

I don't know the manufacture of the optical drive. The only meaningful label is what I assume is a Funai part number: N78F8EUN

[jman98]

I thought RiData was recommended. Something changed in the past couple of years?

I don't know that there ever was a time when RiData was actually any good, but that doesn't mean that people don't recommend them anyway.

[hech54]

I thought RiData was recommended. Something changed in the past couple of years?

I don't know that there ever was a time when RiData was actually any good, but that doesn't mean that people don't recommend them anyway.

Ritek and RiData were great discs when 4x was the maximum speed that manufacturers made. For some reason when 8x came out Ritek and RiData fell behind. I've still got quite a few 4x Ritek +R discs made back around 2002 that are still perfect.

[orsetto]

The suggestion to try FixVTS is about your only solution. Changing to another DVD recorder won't be of much use, since all have some sort of glitch in their authoring that may bite you on some hardware. And theres no longer any alternative to the Magnavox short of the pricey multi-region Pioneer 660 or Panasonic EH-69, or dodgy second-hand recorders. In any case you have hours of material stored on the Magnavox HDD, so you work from there.

Try FixVTS on your most problematic disc, and see if it makes a copy thats playable in your Oppo and PC drives. If so, you're all set to go. Yes, its an inconvenience to have to reburn everything, but many geeks here bring their stuff over to the PC for finishing and a variety of other reasons: its a common enough workflow. For typical large-scale VHS dubbing projects, a DVD recorder+PC FixVTS process still beats dubbing directly to the PC in terms of time and effort required for similar results. If you use DVD+RWs to transport the files between recorder and PC, you won't be wasting discs unnecessarily. Please do try the FixVTS idea, and let us know if it helps: the info could be useful to other Oppo owners.

[videobruce]

Yes, its an inconvenience to have to reburn everything, but many geeks here bring their stuff over to the PC for finishing and a variety of other reasons: its a common enough workflow.

Inconvenience is a huge understatement. It's like waxing your car then realizing you just trapped dirt under the wax and have to go ahead, remove the wax to get rid of the dirt, then re-wax it again.

I will give it a try.

[lordsmurf]

RiData were NEVER recommended media by anybody knowledgeable on blank DVDs. Ritek discs have always had issues with playback/readback (poor reflectivity), as well as quality control.

The discs were cheap and used for duplication some years ago, but that's about it. These days they've been relegated largely to OEM re-branding. I'm sure they're still use for dupe systems, but I've not seen any for a while now. Prodisc and TY are still heavily tying up duplicators that I've come across. FTI is a newcomer.

For no real reason other than the low $1 price, Ritek was popular around 2003-2004. That quickly went away, because of further lowering of their quality, as production was upped to keep pace with the demand. Demand that went away.

[LCSHG]

In stand alone units

I used mostly Verbatim disks And have not had any problems with any 4x -- 8x or those labeled !x to 16X
For a year I have been using Ridata disks Mostly 16x, both +/ - R disks and had not one problem and they as the Verbatim will play in any machine that is working okAnd the pix quility is the same [at least in my view]
A little over 6 months ago I picked op another unit with HDD. It semed to work ok but than started to produce faulty disks Both Verbatim and Ridata .The Firmware was at fault It was replaced with a different version. A problem. but somewhat different was still present The DVD drive was replaced and the unit has worked fine since with either Verbatim or Ridata
The stand alone burns at 4x period
I used a PC and burned both at max speed [16x] the result was basically the same for Verbatim or Ridata . Not Good Or Reliable for either. At 12x or less both were fine

I don’t Know why someone has problems . Any problems I’ve had can be traced back to faulty equip. OR because I Screwed Up. And I’ve used many different disks

I've been asked. What's a Good disk. Well Some say [This ome or That one]
A disk that comes to the front IS TY but I find them to expensive and not that great


PS Edit
A user said the machine will not accept Verbatim disks Well The disks were -R and tne unit was a Burn +R only

[hech54]

RiData were NEVER recommended media by anybody knowledgeable on blank DVDs. Ritek discs have always had issues with playback/readback (poor reflectivity), as well as quality control.

I recommended Ritek and RiDate because the 4x ones worked flawlessly in my old Philips DVDR985 recorder. Many of us who had the Philips recorders (DVDR985, DVDR75, DVDR77 and the DVDR80) used them almost exclusively because they gave us flawless performance. Many of my old Ritek and RiDate discs made with that DVDR985 recorder are still going strong....and the DVDR985 recorder still works after all of these years although it now finalizes discs at almost a snail's pace....but it still works.
I've been at this game almost as long as you. I have traded discs with people from all over the world. I've had the chance to work with different brands of discs from all over the world, created with almost every type of DVD Recorder made....Philips, Pioneer, Panachronic(as they were once nicknamed), etc etc etc.....but I don't have a website.

[videobruce]

See, I knew they were recommended somewhere.

Anyway, as far as this specific recorder is concerned, it's not a disc issue, its a hardware and/or firmware issue. The fact a similar playback issue happens on two different PC software programs when playing back these discs proves it's not the Oppo player. It's these cheap consumer POS recorders.

This appears to be the same situation with Internet browsers. namely Idiot Exploiter will display most any web site simple because; it allows sloppy code. Where as, Opera meets W3C standards (which M$ will never do) so those sites that fail validation will not display properly. The fault is not the browser, its the source, in this case the web master who doesn't know, or doesn't care to do his job correctly.

[orsetto]

I agree completely with your browser remarks , but the analogy does not quite hold up. Your expectations of standalone recorders are understandable but unrealistic: recordable DVD has never been a uniform, any-disc-made-on-anything-plays-anywhere standard. Computer hardware/software varies, burners vary, media (god help us) varies insanely. It took a few years before computer authoring reached a point where most discs correctly authored to meet minimum standards will play on just about anything, but even so there are still stupidly-designed hardware anomalies like the Oppo players, some software players and some portable/car players that refuse to correctly handle many DVD-Rs. I say "stupidly designed" because it is wildly optimistic for any mfr to assume a buyer is only going to play commercial DVDs or meticulously-authored TMPGenc DVD-Rs. It is not 1997, standard def DVD has been around for a generation and has one foot in the grave now, so in 2009 there is no excuse whatsoever for any DVD playback system to "not like" DVDs recorded on any current standalone. If my "ancient" made-in-April-2001 Panasonic RV-31 dvd player can correctly read any disc I put in it, including Magnavox DVD-Rs and hopelessly scratched/marred rental DVDs, a player made in 2009 should be able to do the same.

By their nature standalones need to cut corners slightly when making a DVD-R. Their software is not dynamic or adaptable, it is programmed at the factory to cover one overall recording methodology for all contingencies. This creates discs that are slightly off-spec, every recorder does this to one extent or another. Cursing Funai is a non-starter: Funai has had more than 50% of the worldwide recorder market for the last 5 years. If an Oppo or software player or portable cannot correctly read DVD-Rs created on the worlds runaway best-selling recorders, their designers are shortsighted fools, and thats the end of it. Its perfectly valid to want to use what you might consider "the best" hardware or software players, because you enjoy the higher performance, but high performance in any realm often comes with strings attached. In this case, its limited compatibility with recordable DVD. The choices are to add supplemntary hardware/software to play recorded DVD-Rs, rework recorded DVD-Rs on the PC to make them compatible with your picky players, or record directly onto the PC using the more elaborate, powerful, in-spec software you can't get in a standalone. None of the choices are ideal, you have to pick the least-of-all-evils compromise that works best for you. Been there, done that: I understand the frustration.

[videobruce]

Your expectations of standalone recorders are understandable but unrealistic: recordable DVD has never been a uniform, any-disc-made-on-anything-plays-anywhere standard.

Unrealistic to have something work properly?? If it works in a PC with all the variables involved, it should work better in a device who's sole mission is to record (and playback) DVDs'.

[Seeker47]

If my "ancient" made-in-April-2001 Panasonic RV-31 dvd player can correctly read any disc I put in it, including Magnavox DVD-Rs and hopelessly scratched/marred rental DVDs, a player made in 2009 should be able to do the same.

By their nature standalones need to cut corners slightly when making a DVD-R. Their software is not dynamic or adaptable, it is programmed at the factory to cover one overall recording methodology for all contingencies. This creates discs that are slightly off-spec, every recorder does this to one extent or another.

This coincides with my own experience: the much older, very generic Malata player rarely finds any disc to be a source of indigestion; can't quite say the same about the Oppo, with its much more refined and up-to-date feature set. STRANGE ! Occasionally I will see issues with discs made on either of the Pio DVDRs, when they are played on the Oppo. This is despite using known-good media. If it's a casual watch once item, I live with it. If it's something important, and worth taking the trouble, FixVTS will reliably come to the rescue. The only downside, apart from the extra steps, is that I think you lose chaptering that was done on the DVDR.

[usually_quiet]

Your expectations of standalone recorders are understandable but unrealistic: recordable DVD has never been a uniform, any-disc-made-on-anything-plays-anywhere standard.

Unrealistic to have something work properly?? If it works in a PC with all the variables involved, it should work better in a device who's sole mission is to record (and playback) DVDs'.

PCs have an advantage stand-alone DVD recorders don't have. Everything is spelled out ahead of time, before anything is burned to the DVD. Files can be burned to the disc in the right order and with the correct physical spacing on the disc. The process used doesn't have to allow for additions or deletions.

Stand-alone DVD recorders have to make compromises on some things to allow recordings to be added until the disc is either filled or finalized, and to allow unwanted recordings to be deleted, plus the disc has to be playable on the recorder that made it, even before finalization. The menu can't even be created until the disc is finalized. This is why they make slightly non-compliant discs.

[lordsmurf]

DVD+VR is compliant. DVD-VR is slightly non-compliant.

[LCSHG]

Never Have Used -RW disks Only +RW and they gave me fits Until I found a way [on my own] to handle then Correctly Have been using them for over 2 years without any problems. Have used both + or - r and never any problems with either

Shades on knocking on wood
Early today I had burned a Disk [ it was a Ridata And when I went to finalize it, THE MACHINE LOCKED UP at 11%. It had to be un-plugged. THIS MACGINE had not given me any problems [period,] for 3 years
It. scanned OK and everything else seemed OK. The disk played fine In this machine and 3 others of the same make It showed up as being un-finalized. I went to finalize and Pressed the button Immediately
It went to 11% than went rather quickly 98& and than finish.
The disk works very well in other players of various mfg . And went in my collection

So what’s the answer
The disks/disks is/are no good ----but it works fine
The machine is at fault --- but it’s been fine and is burning & playing fine. I will continue to check it
I screwed up --- in my defense I deny any fault.

OR
S--- Happens --- I go for this one

[lordsmurf]

Sometimes I think people look hard for answers, ignoring more likely/logical ones. All I needed to read was "it was a Ridata" and that's the most likely problem.

[LCSHG]

Sometimes I think people look hard for answers, ignoring more likely/logical ones. All I needed to read was "it was a Ridata" and that's the most likely problem.

I do respect Lordsmurf views and also many others His and others view concerning specific disks could very well be valid, and is a reason I have kept an eye on the Ridata Disks, but I have had no problems with them. A specific disk may not perform correctly if the machine is beset wit problems. In videobruce case [the original post] and others I feel a specific problem is over looked and bl;ame is placed on the disk The problem could very well be the original equipment burned quipment and the Name OPPo doesn’t mean it cant be them, but not likely3 drivess

I feel that Lordsmurf quote especially the first sentence is very much to the point
I would first look at the original unit that burned the disks, and the methods use in the first plac

PS
Did the VHS tapes contain MV

[LCSHG]

Usually-quiet

I havent used a PC in many years but will say that it can produce a very good disk but the stand alone has it'sadvantages, eszpecally a HDD unit with a PC or some standalones to many users try to push a unit to more reolution than is possible with a BAD burn and blame the disk


A Quote
"Stand-alone DVD recorders have to make compromises on some things to allow recordings to be added until the disc is either filled or finalized, and to allow unwanted recordings to be deleted, plus the disc has to be playable on the recorder that made it, even before finalization. The menu can't even be created until the disc is finalized. This is why they make slightly non-compliant discs.
---------------------------------------------------


Not as tand alone with HDD A comprise is in the advantage in using a proper bit rate [or menus] but in the real world much of this is not noticed by many users.
The un-finalized disks do not require playing on the machine that burned them
For many features and if wanted the use of a PC is the only way


PS
THe comment on Non- compliant disksis Something to look for I think most disks are non-compliant But some are and will not or poorly deal with with CP

[lordsmurf]

The proper process for elimination is to try several better discs. If that fails, the it's surely hardware related, being a DVD recorder.

Next course of action after that is cleaning the lens with a good method.
See http://www.digitalfaq.com/forum/showthread.php/clean-dvd-cd-423.html

After that, you're looking at a dead drive.

Also see RW vs -R/+R writing ability. RW goes first.

[Seeker47]

If one were saving tons of $$ by using media now widely regarded as poor quality, there might perhaps be some minor justification . . . but that is not the case. Hardware issues certainly exist, but I just can't see any upside in not giving yourself the best odds for success. And -- IMO -- that would apply to any superior ingredients or components applied to any endeavor.