Basic VCD information

[mdraco]

I am new to VCD's and I have gained much from your forum. I am having a great deal of trouble burning VCD's and recently I managed to speak to a technician who is in the business of creating VCD's, I would like to share what I was told with the forum and open it for Comment. He said:

1)DVD players are of a generation 1,2 and 3. Gen 1 probably won't read CD-R but may or may not read CD-RW. Gen 2 and 3 will read both.
2)Never burn a VCD faster than 4X.
3)The only colour CD-R to use is dark blue.

Your comments are most welcome.

[Truman]

I don't know what kind of generation my dvd player is. It's about 3 years old. I used all available colour CD-R without troubles. Everytime I burn with 12x speed.

[mdraco]

that probably makes sense truman equipment is Australia is behind the states.

[TOMMO]

I burn any type of CDR/CDRW at 12X.

With regards to DVD players, the critical part is whether they are DUAL LASER. These are the type that will play CDR(W).

[karhooi]

did you test your VCD on other systems? or VCD player? My burn speed is 4X and it already create blocky and hang with high pitch sound.


<TABLE BORDER=0 ALIGN=CENTER WIDTH=85%><TR><TD><font size=-1>Quote:</font><HR size=1 color=black></TD></TR><TR><TD><FONT SIZE=-1><BLOCKQUOTE>
On 2001-08-16 19:44:20, Truman wrote:
I don't know what kind of generation my dvd player is. It's about 3 years old. I used all available colour CD-R without troubles. Everytime I burn with 12x speed.
</BLOCKQUOTE></FONT></TD></TR><TR><TD><HR size=1 color=black></TD></TR></TABLE>

[mdraco]

All my VCD's play on the PC OK using Quickvcd, the picture is smooth and the sound is OK. I haven't had a chance to try them on standalone players other than my own. I have had some that worked on my standalone, they haven't all been bad and of those that worked the cd was light blue.
PS I have some crappy LG with one laser and declares that it plays only dvd and vcd.

Cheers to all.

[vitualis]

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On 2001-08-16 19:36:24, mdraco wrote:
1)DVD players are of a generation 1,2 and 3. Gen 1 probably won't read CD-R but may or may not read CD-RW. Gen 2 and 3 will read both.</BLOCKQUOTE></FONT></TD></TR><TR><TD><HR size=1 color=black></TD></TR></TABLE>

First generation DVD drives will not read CD-R or CD-RW reliably.

Many stand-alone DVD players still use these kind of drives. Essentially all DVD-ROM drives will read both CD-R and CD-RW media.

<TABLE BORDER=0 ALIGN=CENTER WIDTH=85%><TR><TD><font size=-1>Quote:</font><HR size=1 color=black></TD></TR><TR><TD><FONT SIZE=-1><BLOCKQUOTE>2)Never burn a VCD faster than 4X.</BLOCKQUOTE></FONT></TD></TR><TR><TD><HR size=1 color=black></TD></TR></TABLE>

Assuming you have a DVD drive that is designed to read CD-R/W media, and your CD-R/W drive and media can handle such high burn rates, there is no reason to stick to 4x burning. However, if your DVD players is only tenuously reading a CD-R/W disc, burn speed can make a difference.

However, the fault is the DVD drive, not the burn speed.

<TABLE BORDER=0 ALIGN=CENTER WIDTH=85%><TR><TD><font size=-1>Quote:</font><HR size=1 color=black></TD></TR><TR><TD><FONT SIZE=-1><BLOCKQUOTE>3)The only colour CD-R to use is dark blue.</BLOCKQUOTE></FONT></TD></TR><TR><TD><HR size=1 color=black></TD></TR></TABLE>

There is no rationale for this. A DVD drive that is designed to read CD-R media will read all sorts.

A DVD drive that is not designed to read CD-R media will read different colours erratically or not at all. There is no evidence that dark blue works better than anything else.

Regards.

[mdraco]

Thanks vitualis for your comments. I will be running some tests on the weekend using dark blue CD's and will post the results.

Cheers to all

[mdraco]

Hi All,

Just an update on this topic, vitualis is quite correct in his comments regarding my first post. It seems that burning speed, color of CD makes little or no difference, if your DVD dosen't pick up CD-R's then thats it. I took the VCD's that I created to a friends place and used his dual laser DVD and they played fine.

Just my luck I happened to buy a gen 1 dvd when LG where dumping them on the market, a lesson to all beware of special deals.

Thanks to all for your comments.

Cheers