Encoding / Codec Details for Sony RDR-HX780

[scotty123]

I've got a Sony RDR-HX780 DVD recorder. Does anyone know what codec it uses when you burn a DVD and finalize it? I had an issue with playing the DVDs in Windows 7 but have since figured it out by installed a codec bundle. Curious though which codec it actually demands its players to have and whether this is unique to Sony DVD Recorders.

[aedipuss]

dvd can only be mpeg. 99.99% mpeg-2 - 720x480 in ntsc land.

[scotty123]

ok - so why do you figure then that Windows 7 wouldn't have an MPEG-2 codec to play it? or are there several MPEG-2 codecs out there of which the one that the Sony recorder uses doesn't shop out-of-the-box with Windows 7?

[hech54]

ok - so why do you figure then that Windows 7 wouldn't have an MPEG-2 codec to play it?

As far as technology goes....DVD's MPEG2 is "older than dirt" (although FAR from obsolete and FAR from being a product of history). If your finalized discs do not play in a computer running Windows 7....you are doing something wrong....plain and simple. DVD is MPEG2, it can be nothing else.

[scotty123]

Strange then ... after installing a Windows Codec pack, it worked. Before that, Windows Media Player didn't recognize it. It played "out of the box" on my XP system. Interested in any other ideas.

[Cornucopia]

Unless I'm mistaken, no stock Win PCs (XP, Vista, or 7) - with the possible exception of MediaCenters - come out-of-the-box with an MPEG2 decoder installed. One must get one (either through getting a DVD-player software app, or by buying Microsoft's WMP MPEG2 plugin, or by getting a freeware/shareware Direcshow codec). Did your "out-of-the-box" come preinstalled with a DVD player software? That's probably why...

Scott

BTW, watch out for those "codec bundles"!