DVD Pausing automatically (when I don't want it to)?

[rootyb]

Okay, I'm thinking this is probably a player compatibility issue or something, but here goes:

Authored a DVD in DVD Studio Pro. Was my first time using DVDSP, but it made sense, and was a lot easier than Encore, imo.

Anyway, gave the DVD to the client, she watched through it and emailed me back, telling me that at 1 hr, 10 minutes and 26 seconds, the DVD pauses for about 20 seconds, then continues playing. She says this doesn't happen when played in her computer (just on her HD-DVD player).

I tried playing the folder directly in DVD Player, and didn't notice any pausing at that point in the video. Also tried it streaming to my Xbox (XBMC). No pausing there, either. Haven't re-burned it to test a burned DVD yet.

Now, when I burnt the copy she has, I did "Build and Format". I know I'm a noob, but I didn't really know the difference between "format" and just "burn". Could that be causing problems?


I've sent her an email asking the following questions:



---------------
Do you have access to any other players you could test it on?
Does it do it every time you play through?
When it pauses, can you hit play right away, and it'll start playing again?
When it starts playing again after 20 seconds, does it pick up right where it left off, or does it skip 20 seconds ahead?
---------------

Just sent the email, so she hasn't answered yet, but I wanted to search around and see if I could find any explanation. Anybody experienced anything like this before?

[guns1inger]

You don't say how long the video is, however this type of behavior is often caused by lower quality media being used, or incompatibilities with the player and the media. The way writable DVD media is created leads to issues with lower quality media on the outer edges, so if problems are going to appear, it will be in the later sections of the disc, as single layer discs write from the centre out.

So my first questions would be

What media are you using ?
What did you burn them with ?
Did you test the disc before you sent it out ?

[rootyb]

Thanks for the quick reply.

The full DVD is approximately an hour and forty minutes.

I'm not positive of the brand, but I believe it's Memorex. (this was not a production run; just a test DVD so the client could check picture/audio quality, and the credits). I did *not* have a chance to test it thoroughly before sending it out (I basically fired up DVD Player right after it finished burning, to make sure it worked at all).

Not sure what you mean by "what did you burn them with". My burner is a samsung dual-layer burner (but this was only a single-layer, single-side disc). I burned it directly from DVDSP (again, using "Build & Format".

If there's a compatibility issue with the DVDs I'm using, it shouldn't be a problem once they get reproduced (as long as they're reproduced onto different brand discs), right? The company that's duping them for me uses Taiyo Yuden, which are pretty great, from what I hear.


Also, the client emailed me back and said that they would try it out in their Xbox, and that after it pauses for 20 seconds, it picks right back up where it left off. It sounds like after that, it plays fine. Maybe just a hiccup in the burn. Dodgy DVDs, I suppose.

Would burning it at a slower speed help? I'll be sending it off to the duping company once I make a couple of credit corrections, and I'd hate for them to get a DVD that they can't copy (or worse, have them copy a defect).

[guns1inger]

First, if you can, stick with Verbatim or TY media, especially for anything important. They are by far the most consistent in quality. A quick search on memorex in our database (to your left) shows a lot of red entries (hint : Red is not good)

Second, are you sure you used DVD Studio pro ? I ask only because your specs show a Windows PC, and DSP is Mac only. My personal preference is never to use the burning engine in the authoring tool. Authoring tools are for authoring, nothing else.

If you did use something other than DSP, and are working on a PC, use the latest version of Imgburn to burn the video_ts folder, then use DVD Info pro or Nero DVD/CD Speed to do a speed test of the disc. Then play it through if possible before sending it to the client (make sure you have time to do this - once might be forgiven, but if you send them repeated problem discs, they will quickly lose faith and go elsewhere).

[rootyb]

Haha, yeah, I'm sure I'm on DVD studio pro. Just havent updated my specs since I went mac. (didn't even remember setting up an account here. Tried my usual username and pw and got lucky.)

usually, I would allot time for a watching, but some last minute changes needed to be made, etc etc etc.

Anyhow, thanks for all the advice. Lots of forums, especially ones as specialized as this, tend to jump all over people that give the slightest hint they're not an expert.