VCD on APEX no more?

[videospence]

Just today I was at the local Circuit City and noticed the APEX 1200 on sale for $64. ...thought it was a great price and got talking with the clerk about how much I love my APEX 1100 for VCD.

That is when he informed me that he had (within the hour) recieved a memo informing him that all future APEX DVD players will no longer support VCD. Bummer!

Anyone else heard of this? ...speculation as to why APEX would do this?

[mpb]

Easy answer: the clerk is full of shit.

Here's why:

1. Apex's newest, the 1600, does support VCD/SVCD/etc. It's barely even reaching store shelves now, and with the AVI and WM support it will probably be popular for a LONG time.

2. VCD-compliant mpeg-1 352x240 @1150k is one of the valid DVD resolutions. So technically, to be able to play DVDs and claim the DVD logo, a player has to be capable of playing a VCD stream. Any DVD you buy might have that shit on it. Dogma's deleted scenes in the special edition, for one example.

3. Also for that reason, it's trivial for a DVD player to play VCDs. The main thing preventing most of them from doing so, historically, has been laser reflectivity... i.e. the issue has been them not playing recordable media, not a problem of refusing to play VCDs. An entire year worth of JVC DVD players claimed VCD support, but would not play CDR media of any kind, even audio CDs, so unless you had an original professionally-produced VCD, the feature was worthless. Any DVD player worth its salt from here on out is supporting VCD... including current Sony, Toshiba, etc models. Given that Apex always has had near-perfect VCD support, it would be technologically nonsensical to try to somehow remove it.

4. If for some legal reason, Apex "stopped" supporting VCD, they would just take the Compact-Disc-Digital-Video logo off the box, stop claiming it, and would likely not change a single circuit, because of the DVD compliance issue.

-Mike

[xl60]

Mike.
Your words are more true than you might imagine. I bought an Apex 1600 2 days ago with plans to playback my own VCDs. I read great things on this unit here at the VCDhelp site but I have been going round and round with this DVD player. It seems I can playback SVCDs but not mpg1 VCDs.
Here's the part..........after reading your post I took a close look at the trademarks on the box. I peeled up a small blank sticker that was covering up something...........underneath was the COMPACT DISC DIGITAL VIDEO
symbol you wrote about! ARRRRGGGGHHHH!!!!

Mark

[BuckWheat249]

Mike sounds pretty arogant for a stupid guy. Apex DVD players manufactured after 4/15/02 do not support VCD because Apex wasn't willing to pony up the $$ for licensing. Refer to their web page

http://www.apexdigitalinc.com/phpfunc/display.php?t=apex_kb&id=159

I took a handful of discs of various formats to my local electronics store. oddly enough all of the 1600s (at $59) would play everything except VCD. VCD is not mentioned on the box. They did have some old stock of 2100s that played my VCDs and yes, VDC was listed on the box. I have yet to burn a cd with an .MPG (or an .MP3) that my 2100 will not play - MPG 1 or 2 CBR, VBR, any old frame rate - even crappy old MPG downloaded with no cleanup or mods...

[bertmartin]

Here's a quote from another forum which was an answer to the VCD support question. I was checking on the 1100W for my granddaughter. This is from APEX tech support. Looks pretty clear!

Apex Digital's Response Is:

this is not true
we no longer support vcd

Thank you for using our website!

Apex Digital Inc.
http://www.apexdigitalinc.com/

[AK349]

THAT'S BULL. MY APEX 2100 PLAYS EVERYTHING:VCD,SVCD,EVERY SORT OF DVD.

IT'S GREAT.

[sullen]

As mentioned, newer players made after the middle of April do not have built in support for VCD as previous versions had. This goes for ALL modes, not just the 1100W. As for the 1600 I would assume it was made before April, if it was made after, then something is wrong with what Apex has told people. The quote above has two negatives in it and is horrible grammar. The are not supporting VCD until...who knows when if ever. There is an annoying work around for the 1100W without VCD support that utilizing putting a JPEG on the disk with the .dat file.

For more info go here:
http://www.nerd-out.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=21729&highlight=jpeg+vcd

and here:
http://www.nerd-out.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=21899

[Faceman101]

Easy answer: the clerk is full of shit.
...2. VCD-compliant mpeg-1 352x240 @1150k is one of the valid DVD resolutions. So technically, to be able to play DVDs and claim the DVD logo, a player has to be capable of playing a VCD stream. Any DVD you buy might have that shit on it. Dogma's deleted scenes in the special edition, for one example....

completely wrong.

[Erwin]

I don't see why they can't just have their DVD players have the ability to play VCDs and just not use the VCD logo on thier box/player. I may be wrong, but I think using to logos may be the only reason for paying the licensing fees (I'm probably wrong though). I have a DVD player that plays VCDs/xVCDs/SVCDs, but it doesn't mention it on the player nor does it mention it on the instructions or box. It only mentions it on the DVD player when a disc is inserted.

[Chad Page]

I think Apex just got caught out by Phillips. Note the player can still play VCD's when encoded as SVCD's... so they probably figured Phillips were going to see if VCD was enabled. Most of the players that can do SVCD do it stealthily. Actually I suspect the only (or close to it) fully licensed SVCD players are the JVC's which have the "CD Super Video" logo.

[eltapa]

You can also try any MINTEK, they play any format.

[manabyte]

I have an Apex Ad-1600 and have no problems playing VCD. Out of curiousity though I went to Apex's site and looked up the specs for their DVD players. Here's the link:

http://www.apexdigitalinc.com/html/ReleasedDVD_Players.html

Look at the formats supported by the various players. It very clearly mentiones SVCD but doesn't say a thing about VCD. So The claims seem to be true. I think that's pretty crappy, and had I known that, I wouldn't have bought an APex even though mine plays VCD. And just by chance, does anyone know how to tell when your Apex player was manufactured?

[kwag]

From their own mouth:

Apex Knowledge Base
Back
Issue Category: DVD Products

Associated Products:

Issue:
Why won't my vcd's play?

Answer:
Apex Digital does not support VCD. The added cost for licensing would raise the price per unit to you the consumer. This format is not popular and is seldom used in North America.

Average Rating: 49%
--------------------------------------------------------

That's units manufactured after april 15, 2002.

[Gargoyle]

Another note - Now Apex is being sued by MPEG-LA, supposedly for not paying royalties for MPEG2 license - here's the link: http://www.apexdigitalinc.com/html/Apex_Response_to_MPEG_LA.html

[therick]

My sister just got an 1100W and it doesn't play VCD-but it doesn't play SVCDs either...it plays nothing...except DVDs