Is ASDA leading a conspiracy?

[Panash]

Looking along the shelves at Asda on Saturday, I did not see a single DVD player capable of playing either VCD or SVCD. Some did mp3, some did jpeg stills, but not one did VCD. Is Asda trying to put the squeeze on perhaps what they regard as a pirate format?

If this is a trend it should be countered as its quite worrying.

Anyone from Asda care to comment?

I relieved to say (to the best of my knowledge) that Tesco still do the Dansai 852, possibly one of the best DVD players out. Well done Tesco.

PN

[devinemi83]

They may simply feel that its a format thats not widely used here so why support it. I have noticed that mainly the cheap DVD players play VCD while the superhigh end wont.


I would seek out an APEX, I have thr AD660 and it plays everything. And its cheap. A cheap APEX can be had for around 75-85.00! They are very high quality.

[homerpez]

Oddly enough, too... I've seen more than a few models that do not ADVERTISE that they play VCD, SVCD, etc, yet they do.

I know of at least a few GE models, for example, that will easily play standard VCD, as well as SVCD, yet they don't say they can play either one. They might not play certain variations (like high-bitrate MPEG-1 video), maybe this is why they don't feel comfortable spreading the word on compatability?

Apex's do play most anything (I would sell you one if you replace the broken ROM drive), also Pioneer, Daewoo are some others to check out.

As I mentioned, I have the broken Apex (cheap ROM unit anyway), and a working Pioneer DV-343. If you buy a new Apex, take warning on the BAD ROM UNIT. The decoder hardware is solid, but the drive itself will crap out quickly (can be replaced with any 6x or slower DVD-ROM drive).

I'd suggest looking on the 'compatability list' on this site for hints on what models do what, or try out discs at a friend's house.

[Craig Tucker]

I read somewhere in a post on this site, that even some of the newer apex players were removing VCD support. Something that I can neither confirm or dispute, just something I read.

Craig

[Craig Tucker]

An example of VCD support being removed is the pacific 750 from Asda, the earlier ones would play VCD and SVCD, and the later ones won't, even though they are the same model.

Craig

[a1anp]

Panash,

You'll find that the Dansai models in Tesco are now also unable to play VCD.

They're all doing it - removing VCD compatability I mean. In another thread, Philips were blamed - for enforcing a royalty to include VCD functions in a DVD player.

If you need a backup player, you might as well get one now before all the VCD-compatible models dry up. Or get a DVD burner!

[Greg12]

WAL-MART/ Sams CLub still has a multitude of VCD/DVD players.