Movies won't play on DVD player

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Movies won't play on DVD player

I am using idvd 5.0. I have made several movies with the internal optical writer using Maxell dvd +R discs which played fine in my dvd players (regular, tv type). My internal writer broke and I have since used two different external writers, both of which support dvd+r, and movies from neither will work in my dvd players - they won't play at all. The movie will play on a PC. I did try writing the movies to a disk file and when I try to bring up the mac DVD Player it says "A Valid DVD drive could not be found".. That may be a totally separate problem or maybe that means the file idvd is creating is bad.. I have 153 gb of free disk space and 689 mb of free memory so I think I am ok there. Any ideas?
Thanks!

IMac, Mac OS X (10.5.8), IDVD 5.0

Posted on Aug 9, 2010 8:41 AM

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Answer 1

Aug 9, 2010 8:57 AM in response to kkambas

Hi

Most often this is due to
• Brand of DVD used
• Type of DVD
• Burn Speed

I only use Verbatim DVDs (would like to try Taiyo Yuden - but can't find them)

I only use DVD-R (can't burn +R on my old Macs) - Never +/-RW

I set down burn speed to x4 (or even x1) - This can't be done in all versions of iDVD

But since iDVD 5 one can save as a DiskImage - then burn this with Disk Util tool
and here set down burn speed to x4.

Just burn to DVD via DeskTop - Do not deliver a Video-DVD but a Data-DVD which can not
playback on DVD-players.

I use Roxio Toast™ to do the burn - simpler than Disk Util tool - but costs a bit.

Yours Bengt W

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Answer 2

kkambas Author

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Aug 9, 2010 9:51 AM in response to Bengt Wärleby

Thank you for the quick response. When I write to a disk image from iDVD shouldn't I be able to then view the movie using DVD Player that is part of the o/s? I keep getting an error "A valid dvd drive can not be found."

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Answer 3

Aug 9, 2010 11:05 AM in response to kkambas

It sounds then like DVD Player checks for a drive, which you don't have, and then refuses to run. That is too bad. I'm not sure there would be a way around it, unless you tried with the external drive attached.

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Answer 4

Aug 9, 2010 10:08 PM in response to kkambas

Hi

When You save as a DiskImage (I do to Desktop to be easily found) You get an icon
ending with .img or .dmg (don't remember which one comes first)

Double click on this and the other will unfold.

Now start DVD-player tool in Application folder.

If Movie don't start direct - go up to File/Open and select the Video_TS folder
in the last icon .img or .dmg

Now it should start to play.

Yours Bengt W

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Answer 5

kkambas Author

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Aug 10, 2010 6:08 AM in response to Bengt Wärleby

I tried this sequence and I still get "There was an initialization error. A valid DVD drive can not be found". Weird. Maybe DVD Player has gotten corrupted. I"ll see if I can find a way to reload it.
Thanks!

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