Recently, somebody asked me to make them a copy of a home movie that they had stored on DVD. I thought this to be simple enough, though. To my suprise it was not what I had expected. First round, I realised that in order for a DVD to play in a DVD player, you need to follow a few simple unwritten and undocumented rules.

• Rule 1: Thou shalt write only at two speed when writing a movie.
• Rule 2: Thou shalt not use useless software that is not completely compatible with your hardware.
• Rule 3: Thou shalt be patient.

This I found to my own dismay. The first time round, I wrote the DVD at eight speed. This completed the entire DVD in about four minutes. I then gave my handiwork to my friend only to discover that it would not play on his R3000 ($500) DVD player. Back to the drawing board. I then tried several different software titles in order to accomplish this SIMPLE task. Still no success. I then thought that maybe the drive I was using was not working properly. I downloaded the firmware upgrade and installed it. Still no luck. Then I remembered that I had made a copy of a in-house training video for a staff member. I went and got hold of the DVD. The first thing I noticed was that the DVD was only two speed. Scientia est Potentia. Knowledge is Power. I then went and wrote another copy of the DVD in question, but this time only at two speed. IT WORKED!

I have searched the Internet to no avail to try and find an answer to this puzzle. It seems that it has something to do with the amount of data that the DVD player tries to read. Maybe the DVD disc reports itself as being two speed, but since DVD players only read at one speed, it may somehow try to compensate for the transfer rate. So much for advanced technology.

Another puzzling thing is the new HD-DVD / Blu-ray DVD standard. It seems that each day these two efforts are gaining more momentum with different giants backing each one. Who will win? When you do find out, do not forget to inform us. I think that a hybrid between the two, using only the best that each has to offer would be the answer. I cannot wait for the battle to begin. It could see the fall in prices like never before experienced in any new technology. We could be seeing cheap drives very soon.

[Neels Mostert]

[tags]hd-dvd,transfer rate,blu-ray,dvd copy,scientia est potentia,neels mostert[/tags]