Part I. Identifying the in compatabilities

Tools Used:

Nero 5.5.10.0
Recordnow DX 4.6 (Which is now available for the sony drives NOT 4.56)
IFOEDIT 95
MYDVD 4
DVDDecrypter
1 Sony DVD+RW disc
Sony DRU500a Latest Firmware


Interesting enough I have a friend that owns a curtis mathis (cmd1000) dvd player along with an apex 660 dvd player. He was making backups of his movies and in the process using IFOEDIT 95. Like most of us he was using the create ifo features. For most dvd players this seems to work fine but not all of them. The DVD's would recognize the disc and display the first frame only. It also recognized the chapters but it would not play in the CM top player. With the release of Nero 5.5.10.0 it no longer even does this.

With this information I did find that the cmd1000 would play movies created with MYDVD. So I began to experiment with myDVD. Sure enough I captured a 30 second tv clip and burned it with a single menu. It played without problems in the cmd1000, apex5131, apex 1200, and apex 1201. So I decided to just copy that hole (unprotectred) dvd onto my hard drive and reburn it in Nero 5.5.10.0 to see if I could identify the problem with Nero. After burning in UDF,UDF/ISO, ISO UDF 1.02, UDF 1.02 Forced Xbox compatability I had no success. None of the burns would be recognized by the cmd1000.

Software Change: Recordnow DX

I now tried burning the DVD using the recommended settings and closing the disc. It played without problems. So I decided to try and backup one of my movies using my original process. Ripping movie and streams keeping them in vobs and using ifoedit 95 to create new IFO's. The final process lead me to my first finding. DVD was recognized but the first frame played and thats it.

At this point I am suspecting the IFO file. So I found my CAVEMAN DVD which is only 4 gig and used decrypter to make an exact copy menus and all. I burned the ISO with Nero 5.5.10.0 and Recordnow DX 4.56. Both discs played in all the players no problem. So I then ripped just the movie and recreated the ifo files with ifoedit 95. Since I already identified that Nero is just not burning right, I started with the Recordnow DX. I set the layout and burned away. Same problem as before, single frame and no playing.

Root Of The Problem: Creating the IFO Files.

So at this point I realized that while IFOedit did a great job making the new ifo files, something was still missing that made it incompatable with some top players. (My goal is to make a backup compatable with as many players as possible)

On my hard drive I still had the caveman dvd backed up and I backed up the original IFO file before recreating my new ones. So I decided to start comparing them. While I did not do this extensively I had the original vts_01_0.ifo. I was messing with the buttons on ifoedit 95 and found under vob extras that create new ifo was available. So out of curiosity I clicked it. An interesting menu came up with some cool options. First thing I did was creating the ifo files in a separate directory so I could keep the original. So creating away ifoedit did. What was different is that it used the original vts_01_0.ifo file to build them.

With these new merged ifo files created I decided why not try to burn this. So using the recordnow dx 4.6 which I just upgraded this evening, I burned away. SUCCESS, not only did the dvd play in ALL the above top players, the captions and all looked verbatem. (I know you can copy and paste the colors) I am lazy and want try and do it as close to one step as possible. Thinking maybe this was just a fluke, (Like The Charges Going To the SuperBowl a few years back) I tried backing up my Back To the Future 3 disc. With this It added more complication. I would have to split the dvd since it was over 4.7gb.

The Back To the Future3 experiment.

I ripped it using DVD Decrypter only taking us subtitles and 5.1 ac3 audio. Once again I found myself using the IFOEDIT 95 viewing the ORIGINAL VTS_01_0.IFO file. Under the VOB Extras I selected create new ifo files. One of the options in the settings for this is splitting DVD-rs. So I selected this option. Now I had 2 new directories disc 1 and disc 2, but they did not have the VIDEO_TS.IFO in them, just vts_01_0.ifo's. So when the split was done I re-created the IFO's again using the above method and then I burned it using Recordnow DX. Once again Success. Being overjoyed and like Nero 5.5.10.0 better than Recordnow DX I then tried the Nero again. The disc was not Identified in the cmd1000 but all the other players worked.


If you made it this far reading than kudos for you. I made this as detailed as possible just walking you through the process of elimination that I used. My goal as with many of you guys is to make consistantly High compatable backups of our DVD's. Compatability starts with being playable on as many set top players and computers as possible. I imagine this minor compatability problem may allow a small percentage of additional players to work with our burns. I will continue to disect as to what the difference is in the ifo files themselves, and in the mean time I will use the above methods. I encourage all of you to be diligent in your attempts improve comatability and report your findings to the mass in similiar detail. Maybe cleared than mine. If any of you already know the difference in the IFO files please let me know, to save me time.


GL All