Copy Custom DVD-R to another DVD-R or +R?

[jthompson99]

I have some custome DVD-R's that I bought from a friend, I tried copying one of them to a blank DVD+R but when I put the copy into my home DVD player it says "Disc Error". Now, I can take that same DVD and put it in my Computer DVD player and comes right up and plays no problem. Do I need to copy my Custom DVD-R's to only new blank DVD-R's and not DVD+R's? Or someone mentioned to me that maybe I just need a different media? Right now I am using Phillips DVD+R's and I was told to try Verbatim or some other ones.

Does anyone know what I did wrong or have any suggestions for me?
Thanks.

[mkelley]

How did you copy it?

There are all kinds of possibilities here -- you may indeed have bad media, but I wouldn't immediately jump to that conclusion. When you put the DVD you copied into your computer can you see the files there? Are there two folders, VIDEO_TS and AUDIO_TS at the root directory? And are there VOB files in the VIDEO_TS folder?

One possibility is that you copied the disk wrong -- a DVD needs to be formatted a certain way and if you just "copied" the files over (like burning backup files to a CD) then a standalone player won't play the DVD.

There isn't any problem with backing up a +R to a -R or vice versa. But we would need more information before we could help you further.

[SLICK RICK]

Sounds like a media problem to me, your DVD player might have problems recognizing DVD+R. As to what media you should try, I use TDK DVD-R and have no problems and have no problem with playback. I use to use Verbatim but read alot of post about the different media codes when being put through DVDInfo. So I checked a few of my own and it was true, and I did not like that because you did not know who was really making them. So I stopped using them.

GOOD LUCK,

SLICK RICK

[SLICK RICK]

One more thing before you go out a buy a new batch of media. The most succesful way that I have found to copy a DVDR to DVDR is to use DVD Decrypter and copy to hard drive and then burn to DVDR using whatever software you like.

SLICK RICK

[mkelley]

Yes, but don't confuse this guy -- the DVDs he got from a friend are most likely not encrypted and therefore DVDDecrypter isn't needed. All he really needs to do is copy the VIDEO_TS and AUDIO_TS folders to his hard drive and then burn them correctly.

[jthompson99]

SlickRick and Mkelly, when I copied it I just opened ROXIO and did COPY DISC. I put in the original and put in the blank and hit copy. I just downloaded that DVDDecrypter program so maybe I will give that a try. I may try the TDK media as well. Any other input would be great.

Mkelly, yes I could see the VIDEO_TS on the root of the DVD using Windows Explorer. There is no AUDIO_TS but there is sound on the DVD? There are 3 types of files under the VIDEO_TS root, they are:

.BUP
.IFO
.VOB

Any other input?
Thanks for the help guys.

[mkelley]

Your problem then is how you burned the disks. A DVD is a special case disk, and as a general rule you can't just do a disk copy of it.

Here's the easy way -- drag that VIDEO_TS folder onto your hard drive. Make another folder, AUDIO_TS (not strictly necessary but it will conform more to the DVD standard -- it will be empty) and then copy both folders using either Nero or Record Now (trust me -- Roxio is a piece of crap that is only wasting space on your hard drive) in DVD mode. If you don't have Nero you can download the 30 day free trial, although I much prefer Record Now. I can almost guarantee you things will then be fine.

[jthompson99]

mkelley, thanks for the valuable info. I will download Nero or Record Now and do what you suggested. For some reason I thought doing a "Disc Copy" would do the trick.........I guess this is how you learn to do things the right way. Since you prefer Record Now, I think I will try that one first.

Thanks again.