Asda Pacific 1002W UK DVD Player unable to play DVD-R Media?

[djrampant]

Hi guys I need your help/recommendations.

I previously had a Cyberhome CH400 DVD player bought from WHSmiths, and this played all my DVD’s absolutely fine with no problems. However, after about 11 months the picture kept freezing on random DVD’s (both original and dvd-r). I tried these DVD’s in a friend’s player and my pc and they played fine so I took the player back to the shop.

They informed me that they were unable to source any of these players and exchanged the Cyberhome for a Ronin 215. As this was multi region and clearly stated on the player it played dvd-r media I was happy.

However I got the player home and tried some of the problematic DVD’s and they still froze all the time. So I then leant them to another friend (who had the Pacific 1002W from Asda) who kindly agreed to watch the films and see if they played on his player, which they all did with no problems.

I then returned Ronin player to WHSmiths and got a full refund. Off I went to Asda to buy the 1002W thinking my problem was finally solved! I bought the player, got it home, set it up and applied the multiregion hack. Then I tried my Region 1 copy of Finding Nemo. The player locked up just loading the menu for the film! I was unable to access anything so had to power the player off and try again. This time it worked, so I tried the same problem dvd-r disc and it locked the whole player again!

Sorry for the essay, but what I am after is a recommendation for a budget dvd player that can play dvd-r media with no problems.

Is the 1002w a poor player? (I only bought it last week after reading the reviews on this site that were glowing but a little old) or have I just been really unlucky and should try exchanging it again?

Please Help.

Thanks.

[anaboland]

I don't own one myself, but i know 3 people who do and theirs play dvd-r ok so i guess your either unlucky with your players or your using a make of media it don't like(try using Ritek or Taiyo Yuden), or the discs are authoured in some way the players don't like ?

Is your Nemo an original, if so does it us RCE protection, try setting the player to region 1 not multi-region

[djrampant]

Hi,

My Discs are Ritek Dye they are branded Datasafe which according to most sources are really realiable.

I will try and set the region to 1, but are there any limitations on the number of changes that can take place? Also as it worked second time I am dubious that this may be the cause.

Thanks.

[JMO]

I believe the Pacific 1002 hates Finding Nemo (it may be the only disc this player has issues with. As for playing DVD-Rs, the Pacific is well known for playing anything you throw at it, so I suspect the DVD-Rs you've been trying out are more likely to have burn compatibility issues rather than being dud media.

PS - Don't mess around with the Pacific's multiregion setting. It's a tank when it comes to things like RCE, and setting to a specific region defeats the purpose in setting multiregions.

[andyp1]

Poor media and region hacks are not the issue , as he said the disc play perfectly in other players amongst them and specifically a Pacific 1002W.

I just think you've been unlucky , I'd take it back and swap for another one the same first , your friends is obviously fine so you know that in theory yours should play them.

I'm sure Asda knock out hundreds if not thousands of these machines , there's bound to be a percentage of duff ones.

[Roderz]

I got 1 of these as well as 3 of my friends and all play dvd-r fine, form princo's to ritek's (only exception was tdk02 - fakes I think)
Looks like your just very unlucky

[djrampant]

I went and swapped the player last night for a new one, and so far it plays all the discs I have put in it.

However, there is another issue

My TV is a widescreen, so I set the TV Type to widescreen in the menu. However, no matter what type of disc I put in the player it showed the output as full screen. For example if the disc was a widescreen it showed it as a full screen picture (the image filled the top and bottom of the screen but had black bars at either side), if the disc was full screen the picture was even smaller (it was square with black bars completely surrounding the image).

After physically powering off the player and back on again it did display in widescreen but only widescreen. So if a full screen disc was put in it would display in widescreen (cutting off the top and bottom of the image).

My TV is Auto Aspect Ratio switching, with works with any other source (e.g. sky analogue ps2 etc) so I really don't think it is that.

Is it the player has a fixed output signal and cannot change it depending on what disc is inserted, or have I got another duff one?

Please help.