No problems here either. I did have some clients a while back who's DVD player was some no name brand I had honestly never heard of before and was something like 6 years or more old. They wanted to replace it anyway and bought a Sony player (the brand I always recommend because it just works) and then everything was fine.

Ah. I see this same discussion is already taking place over on the Vegas forum. Well, no sense in me wasting my time here then.

--Scott

Not sure if my problem is the same as yours, but discs I made with DVDA 1 played fine on all my players, but the DVDs I made with DVDA ver 2 and 3 won't play on my older player (Philips MX1050 home theatre system from 2001).

The menus will play and the first movie/video/title will play, but all other videos will not. When you try to play the items, the DVD player stops. Hit play again and the first menu or first play object plays. If I know the Title and Chapter, I can use the DVD player's controls to select that title manually and play it.

This only seems to happen with older players (circa 2001) but it's frustrating because DVDA1 made perfectly compatible DVDs for the same player. It must have something to do with the new features added in the newer versions of DVDA (end actions, etc).

And it's not just the DVDs that I make. Sony's own Tutorial DVD on Vegas5/DVDA2 does the same thing!

DVDA2 does indeed create the DVD structure differently than DVDA1, it's been awhile but my memory says the DVDA1 structures were much simpler and the VOB naming convention was different (I suspect an ambiguity in the DVD spec that allowed different interpretations of the naming and may well be the issue you are seeing) - but your problem doesn't sound like the one originally described.

The bottom line is that unless you use something like Scenarist and know how the DVD structures work and what pitfalls to avoid with older players you're always going to have the potential for issues with older players. Even Hollywood movies sometimes get released with issues - I seem to remember a Disney movie that was actually recalled because of playability issues on some players; I was surprised that National Treasure really pushed the envelope for DVD authoring, and I'll bet there are some players that don't handle the treasure hunt correctly.

--Scott

In which case, would there be a reference somewhere regarding DVD structuring, or is it something you simply learn with experience because no one's ever had the inclination or time to actually write it down?

There's an actual specification that you can purchase from the DVD Forum, books start at $5,000 (may be more, depending on which book you want).

You can get an unofficial spec from www.dvd-replica.com - however, this spec is not complete and is certainly not official, though it contains a lot of useful information. If you're ever going to do low-level authoring (which you cannot do with DVDA) then you should consider picking up a copy of the unofficial spec if you don't have $5k to spend. Also useful would be to get VOBedit and IFOedit programs (downloadable from doom9.net); a reasonably priced authoring package that give you low-level access is DVD Lab Pro.

As has been discussed on the Vegas forum, your issue doesn't sound like a structure issue.

--Scott

>As has been discussed on the Vegas forum, your issue doesn't
>sound like a structure issue.

Unforuntately, the replication company are now adament that it's an authoring fault.

Is DVDA3 able to output to DLT as this is something that may make these hassles decrease in the future?

Okay, ignore that question, as the answer's yes.

It sure would be nice if they told you exactly what the issue was.

Outputting to DLT doesn't make things any safer - DLT is simply a different medium. If you've got structure issues or bitrate issues, they will still exist on the DLT.

--Scott

The replicator should have run the Eclipse verifier on the Video_TS folder and should be able to tell you what the problem(s) are. I would 'assume' Sony ran the Philips verifier.

Ed B