New nastier version of ARccOS released - Dec 8th

[Rich86]

Just for the record:

The information on a Laserdisc is stored as a frequency-modulated (FM) signal, recorded as pits and lands of variable length. The video information is analog, and stored not much differently (at least in concept) than the method used for videotapes. In addition, you have two tracks of analog audio, and two tracks of digitally-encoded PCM audio, stored along with the video.

They do contain some very, very rudimentary playback-control capabilities, but it's not much more than the ability to make the player pause itself at the end of a chapter-stop until told to proceed forward by the user. It has no "virtual machine" that can run complex playback-control programs, the way a DVD does.

The only thing I would add to this is that towards the end of life of the laser disc format, 5.1 AC-3 digital signals were available via one of the analog stereo channels on some releases. A limited number of DTS 5.1 laser discs were released via this methodology also. But you have to have a laser disc player that can process the signal and include a RF AC-3 output jack and a RF demodulator (either standalone or a preamp/receiver equipped with one) to access that signal. I think the audio quality of these 5.1 laser discs are comparable to DVD's - but the video is usually not.

There were also manufacturing problems, particularly with Columbia/Tristar (figures) with "laser rot". Frequently you will find one of your favorite laser discs giving you colored flecks of snow on the screen, due to oxidation caused by the failure of the manufacturing process. This can get so bad the disc becomes unwatchable - or even unplayable. Well - so much for recalling old technology, eh? Although I still have many laser discs. Some material you still cannot get on DVD.

[dphirschler]

I agree that disc boxes should have labels. Maybe even suggested and recommended setups to enjoy the content fully.

The DVD logo should be all that is necessary. If the DVD logo is present, the DVD should play in your player. Otherwise something is wrong with either the disc or the player.

But aside from that, I take issue with a DVD that is deliberately screwed up. I don't like waiting unnecessarily for my player to jump from index to index, change laser focus 21 times, read bad cells and finally default on something to play. It should play right away without pause.

Furthermore, I don't want to sit through 10 minutes of previews and other stupid crap when I want to watch the movie. Let me skip these. Hell, if Sony wants to stop people from making copies, they (and other studios) should remove that crap from the disc. That's probably one of the top reasons I desire to make a backup, to remove the garbage and get right to the movie. The other main reason is to protect the original from the damage caused by kids and carrying the disc in and out of the car.


Darryl

[ROF]

I agree that disc boxes should have labels. Maybe even suggested and recommended setups to enjoy the content fully.

The DVD logo should be all that is necessary. If the DVD logo is present, the DVD should play in your player. Otherwise something is wrong with either the disc or the player.

There is nothing wrong with my Verbatim DVD+r discs yet they refuse to play in certain players. I also own dual layer discs which refuse to play in quite a few older players. In my opinion the DVD logo is way mor than insufficient for compatibility. There also some consumers who oddly enough believe a DVD should play a CD Player/Rom because it's the same size and characterisitics of a CD.

[ROF]

Furthermore, I don't want to sit through 10 minutes of previews and other stupid crap when I want to watch the movie. Let me skip these. Hell, if Sony wants to stop people from making copies, they (and other studios) should remove that crap from the disc. That's probably one of the top reasons I desire to make a backup, to remove the garbage and get right to the movie.

After the disc is analyzed and begins playing have you tried hitting stop twice and then play again? This works in every DVD player/recorder I've tried and will automatically begin playing the main movie (first angle).

[TooLFooL]

jesus people, lets all bash ROF again...

look, ALL players "SEARCH" before the movie starts, that is because a dvd does not play straight through like a record, REMEMBER?

this copy protection doesn't cause undue stress to your player, it does it's "search" thing, and plays just fine.
it DOES however, drive your backup software crazy, causing all kinds of errors.

thats it, thats all.

[dphirschler]

After the disc is analyzed and begins playing have you tried hitting stop twice and then play again? This works in every DVD player/recorder I've tried and will automatically begin playing the main movie (first angle).

Yes I picked that tip up from you in another thread. It works most of the time. But I should not even have to do that. Every DVD should boot right into the menu.


Darryl

[shelbyGT]

After the disc is analyzed and begins playing have you tried hitting stop twice and then play again? This works in every DVD player/recorder I've tried and will automatically begin playing the main movie (first angle).

Yes I picked that tip up from you in another thread. It works most of the time. But I should not even have to do that. Every DVD should boot right into the menu.


Darryl

I'm tired of people bitching about this. A couple seconds or minutes added on to your movie isn't that big of a deal. It's advertising, and you enjoy a WHOLE HELL of a lot in your life because of it. Free or reduced pricing because an advertiser is picking up part of the tab. Live with it, enjoy it, get used to it. But please.... the bitching won't do much to stop it.

[ROF]

@dphirschler

I couldn't agree more, but I guess it's just a small price to pay. I wish television didn't have commercials. Afterall I am paying $80 a month for mostly commercials. Ever try and watch TV on Sunday mornings between midnight and 4AM? Almost every station is infomercials. I wish they'd just play the countries national anthem and just static for those hours. It was much better than the "paid programming" as they call it.

[shelbyGT]

@dphirschler

I couldn't agree more, but I guess it's just a small price to pay. I wish television didn't have commercials. Afterall I am paying $80 a month for mostly commercials. Ever try and watch TV on Sunday mornings between midnight and 4AM? Almost every station is infomercials. I wish they'd just play the countries national anthem and just static for those hours. It was much better than the "paid programming" as they call it.

What? You don't like the silver bullet chopper? C'mon!

[ROF]

The Mini-Chopper Red is an exception.

It's not like I'm complaining. I can just turn the TV off.

[cykedout]

Update:

Fengtao sent me an update for DVD Fab Decrypter and I've tried it on the problem dvds Cool Money and Kekexili Mountain Patrol with mixed results. His update did allow me to open the titles with VobBlanker after I had ripped them to my hard drive. I then tried to wash them with both VobBlanker and FixVTS and I had one success and one failure. Mountain Patrol worked, in that I could blank the problem (unreferenced) cells which contained the LAYER BREAK back and forth switches and besides which the dvd size was about 4 gigs only.

However, Cool Money is more problematic. It is more than 5 gigs, so requires shrinking and when I opened it with DVD Shrink after removing (blanking) the problem cells at the start of the movie, it comes in at 4518 megs, which is slightly too large to process i.e. Shrink's (green) size/content bar is just into the red. And the minimum point in the Compression Settings is 98.9% i.e it can't be shrunk. I was wondering if I'd missed something so I checked the VTS_01.ifo file using IFOEdit and spotted something I'd missed. It seems SONY stuck a LAYER BREAK cell in the middle of the film and unlike the other cells at the start which have virtually no size or frame length, this one does -- it's 88 megs and lasts 1 min 42 seconds, right in the middle of the film.

I checked the title in PowerDVD and it jumps over this break as if it doesn't register it as a chapter point i.e. chapter stops listed at 39:59, 48:48 and 50:30 jump past the 48:48 point when you press the next chapter button going from chapters 6 to 7. clever of Sony as you can't actually delete nearly two minutes of the film.

I reckon that they released two slight modifications of this variant to see what software could OR would deal with this. (I bet they're reading this post and laughing their heads off. Or at least someone in some company working for them that watches the forums.)

I know there are other authoring and ripping programs out there that I don't use, but I prefer the simple easy to use solutions. Someone else is going to have to try further to see if they can solve this before the next (major) releases.

Cykedout


PS. There is one more radical workaround for this. Using IFOEdit, create new IFO files for the VOBs and then Shrink should see it. My mate tried this and it worked, but it does mean losing additional parts of the title. BTW, Cool Money had no other features on it, so it doesn't matter. I guess Sony are testing the waters with these and who knows waht other (minor) titles.

[ROF]

How do the movies play across these layer breaking unreferenced cells? Is there any noticeable stutter?

I can't find these movies are they available in the USA?

[whitejremiah]

reguarding previews and forced screens at the begining of movies, i hate them......ive got a lot of older dvd's that dont have any/maybe 1 at tops things like that then they go to either the menu or some just play the movie itself and jump to the menu after the movie is done...what the heck was wrong with that? if you are paying for a movie, i dont see why you should be forced to sit through previews time after time......advertising on tv, sure, tv programs cost money to put on.....advertising on the internet, sure, cuz bandwidth costs money...advertising on a dvd? WHY? you already paid for the dvd......anyone care to explain why you should have to sit through ads on dvd's when you didnt have to 3-4 years ago, even?

[ROF]

reguarding previews and forced screens at the begining of movies, i hate them. if you are paying for a movie, i dont see why you should be forced to sit through previews time after time......advertising on tv, sure, tv programs cost money to put on.....advertising on the internet, sure, cuz bandwidth costs money...advertising on a dvd? WHY? you already paid for the dvd......anyone care to explain why you should have to sit through ads on dvd's when you didnt have to 3-4 years ago, even?

Did you examine my post above? You don't have to sit through them. You click three button after the DVD is analyzed (Stop, Stop, Play) and the main movie(first angle) will begin playing. You have to sit through them for the same reasons you listed above for other forms of media. It costs money to produce, market, and deliver DVDs to your door. Once you buy or rent one they want to entice you to buy more.

[r0lZ]

The layer break flags present in the ARccOS protected cells are not the problem, and are present on most of the latest ARccOS DVDs. Nothing new here.

Have you tried to rip those DVDs with the PSL2 plugin for PgcEdit and DVD Decrypter? It should work w/o problem on all ARccOS DVDs with a similar structure. And the "remove crap" pass, unique to the plugin, makes it possible to use DVD Shrink w/o problem.

[cykedout]

The layer break flags present in the ARccOS protected cells are not the problem, and are present on most of the latest ARccOS DVDs. Nothing new here.

Have you tried to rip those DVDs with the PSL2 plugin for PgcEdit and DVD Decrypter? It should work w/o problem on all ARccOS DVDs with a similar structure. And the "remove crap" pass, unique to the plugin, makes it possible to use DVD Shrink w/o problem.

Thanks, r0lZ.

I don't really know enough about the internal structure of dvds to tell the ins and outs of exactly howeach of these protections work. I know a fair bit, so any help to expand my knowledge is appreciated. I've looked at the PGCEdit option before, but up until now combinations of other prorams work easier and haven't given much in the way of problems.

Just for everyone's curiosity, the new version of DVD Fab Decrypter, the link sent to me by fengtao, worked perfectly (in the end) after some experimenting. The only drawback for me is that it took me 4 - 5 times longer than normal to rip it to my hard drive (75 minutes). I don't know if it it's my set up as fengtao stated it normally shouldn't take as long. I'll have to look into it.

I've also passed the IFOs to other decrypting related parties, so other of the popular software packages should have solutions to this new ARccOS soon.

Cykedout