SVCD playback Puzzle - Please help!!!

the_ripper wrote on 5/21/2002, 10:27 AM
I just bought the "cure-all" DVD player that can play MP3's with random function, DVD's, VCD's, and SVCD's. It is the pioneer dv-440....Well...It does do all of this however on SVCD movie i have scrolls when you play it??? It plays fine on my $89 Daewoo, but on the pioneer it is flakey. Any Ideas why this one movie bombs out on my pioneer? could it be a VARIANT of SVCD not understood by the $200 pioneer, yet accepted by the Daewoo firmware?? I wondered if it was a VBR issue or something. Any thoughts would be appreciated. the_ripper

Comments

kcarroll wrote on 5/21/2002, 2:30 PM
the ripper;

I am in no way an expert on stand alone DVD players, but one of my primary goals was SVCD production. In order to find a DVD player that would do the job, I ended up going from store to store with a disk in my hand and trying them.

I looked at them all, from the $1000 units with DVD write capability, on down to the bottom end. Much to my amazement, the unit that did the best job of playing my disk was a $79 APEX.

I was so puzzled by this, I did some research. It appears that SVCD was originally a Chinese developement intended to get around paying royalties to the people who held the rights to the DVD formats. As a consequence, the first really large market for SVCD disks was in China. The players that have really good SVCD compatibility seem to be the ones produced by companies that market extensively in China. Any player that was primarily intended for the American market should be checked out carefully, as it is much less likely to be fully SVCD compatible.

Players with partial compatibility can show poor resolution, jittery or snowy playback, poor audio, or other problems like the "fast forward" control not working correctly.

If you already knew all this, sorry about the babble.

kcarroll
the_ripper wrote on 5/21/2002, 2:45 PM
Hey I like babble, its better than seeing a goose egg by my posting :) Yes, I knew some of this...Like I said, My DAEWOO (Korean) plays anything I give it, for about $89. It is even Region adn Macrovision Free. Where it lacks? NO OPTICAL out. No Random or programmable Mp3 player. It just puzzles me on the pioneer have such a picky SVCD option. the_ripper
BillyBoy wrote on 5/21/2002, 6:28 PM
It depends on the model. I have an older Pioneer 333 and it plays anything I've thown at it flawlessly. VCD's, SVCD, XVCD, (constant bitrate, variable bitrate) home brew DVD and now I've tried lower bitrate DVD also to squeeze more on the disc and it handles that too.

Tip: If you're not ready to move up to DVD, you can make very acceptable SVCD videos and add a menu system like you see with DVD titles using Ulead's Movie Factory.
johnmeyer wrote on 5/22/2002, 10:27 PM
Check out this site to see what other people who own your DVD player have been able to to play:

DVD Player Compatibility List
the_ripper wrote on 5/23/2002, 11:27 AM
johnmeyer, funny how you give that link...I bought my dv440 a week ago based on some data on the site you reference :) I like the site. I cant understand why one movie wont play....All the rest do...Must be how the movie (OK its spiderman...) was produced / formatted. the horz scrolls... The person who gave it to me gave me a few more that work fine. It is also evident all three svcd discs...weird. I will have to pull the content apart to see what is different about the movie from the others. It plays fine in my $89 Daewoo??... the_ripper