8mm Forum: More DVD Rot

This is topic More DVD Rot in forum General Yak at 8mm Forum.

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Posted by Paul Adsett (Member # 25) on April 01, 2016, 06:35 PM:

Yesterday I was transferring some video's taken on my Sony DVD camcorder. These videos were originated on the little Sony 1.4GB DVD-RW. Well I loaded up a disc shot in 2008, which contained some special videos of my mum and friends in Wales. The camera refused to play it back, as did my DVD player. The error message was ' damaged or incompatible disc'. I cleaned the disc, which looks fine, all to no avail.
So here we have another example of 'disc rot' on a disc just 8 years old!
No wonder the movie studios archive everything on film [Frown]

Posted by Andrew Woodcock (Member # 3260) on April 01, 2016, 06:42 PM:

That's why we love it here Paul!

40+ years on, and our films still show and often look Superb! [Wink]

Posted by Kenneth Horan (Member # 3) on April 01, 2016, 06:59 PM:

Digital is not archivable. Tape, disc, flash memory all corrupt. That is why I've had my family videos from the 90's on forward recorded on 16mm sound film by Marco in Italy.

Posted by Andrew Woodcock (Member # 3260) on April 01, 2016, 07:06 PM:

Digital of today, provides the best possible of everything, but you simply have to back up your treasure BEFORE it gets corrupted or Rots on a Western Digital Hard Drive or equivalent decent reputable system and then...back it up again if it's so valued, Lord knows, it's cheap enough nowadays so no mishaps occur!

It's now a fast paced moving insincere world out there, gotta be quick now in this Jungle!

Very sad, but all too true unfortunately!!

1967 saw the dawn of my quote, never could it be more relevant, than 49 years on here!

so ...C'mon Baggy....Get With The Beat!"

Posted by Paul Adsett (Member # 25) on April 01, 2016, 10:01 PM:

There appears to be no advance warnings about imminent failure of digital media. It can literally play fine one day and fail the next. The bit stream is either readable or its not.
At least with digital video tape you can simply wind through any bad spots.
I have never understood why DVD players are incapable of simply advancing through any bad sections, instead they just hang up and refuse to budge.

Posted by Kenneth Horan (Member # 3) on April 01, 2016, 10:19 PM:

When a DVD is inserted into a player, the player reads the disc's table of contents. This tells the player about the disc, where the chapter stops are, etc. This is loaded into the player's memory. If there is any corruption in this table of contents data, the player can't load it into memory, the player can't identify the disc and the disc will not play. This data first read by the player is recorded on the inside of the disc, right next to the disc's center hole which is stressed each time the disc is removed and replaced in it's case. Any air creeping into the disc's layers can corrode the aluminum sandwiched between the two plastic discs. This is what is commonly called "laser rot". It is actually corrosion of the aluminum layer. It is microscopic. So you can not see it with the naked eye.

Posted by Janice Glesser (Member # 2758) on April 01, 2016, 11:02 PM:

That's very unfortunate Paul . You still may be able to recover the vob files. I have ripped corrupted DVDs and successively created a new DVD. It requires some special applications, but if the PC can read the files on the disc it can be saved.

Posted by Paul Adsett (Member # 25) on April 01, 2016, 11:18 PM:

Maybe they should have designed the DVD'S to run from outside to inside, like an LP record.
Many of the retaining devices in DVD cases require considerable force to get the DVD off the hub, inducing bending in the DVD. You would think by now that a successful, non-damaging, and standardized design for holding the DVD in the case would have emerged.

Posted by Kenneth Horan (Member # 3) on April 02, 2016, 12:20 AM:

Paul, Janice is correct. If your computer can read the disc, even if it won't actually play it, you can copy the VIDEO_TS folder which contains the VOB files and re-author them onto a new DVD. I have done this using Toast on my Mac.

Posted by Tom Photiou (Member # 130) on April 02, 2016, 02:52 AM:

This is so annoying but also sad if you cannot retrieve those valuable moments.
It also makes me cringe when i look on e-bay and see so many people selling there actual home movies of ,(presumably), family and friends and holidays etc. I have no idea why anyone would buy these but more so i cannot understand why anyone would sell them. I am assuming a lot of them are people who have had them transferred to a digital medium and are simply getting rid of there old cine. I think many of these people will be sorry one day and in a very sad way as all those memories will be gone forever.
We got out an old home movie Thursday night & it was so good to see it again. Glorious colour like it was when new. And i saw my Dad again!

Posted by Rob Young. (Member # 131) on April 02, 2016, 03:46 AM:

I agree with Janice and Kenneth.

See if the disc will open in your PC Paul.

All may not be lost!

Posted by Andrew Woodcock (Member # 3260) on April 02, 2016, 07:57 AM:

I know exactly what Tom is saying here. I captured many of my closest family members including my own father on cine film, these people often are no longer with us now as in his case and my own very sadly.

These are personal memoirs and are priceless pieces of footage in the hands of the people they are associated to, but worthless to anyone else.

I cannot understand the desire to trade in these prints either when they are purely family films and memoirs.

Posted by Maurice Leakey (Member # 916) on April 02, 2016, 08:43 AM:

I agree with Paul.
It has always worried me that some DVDs are so difficult to remove from their fixing hub, particularly when they bend slightly before coming lose.
The designers should have thought of such possible problems.

Posted by Ty Reynolds (Member # 5117) on April 02, 2016, 10:33 AM:

If you have to force the disc out of its case, you're doing it wrong. Pressing on the centre hub will release the disc - it should easily lift out. If your case still requires that you flex the disc, then replace the case.

I've used a program called Isobuster to recover data from damaged discs, as well as from discs that have not been finalized.

Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on April 02, 2016, 06:54 PM:

Paul, try putting the disc in a PC and see if you can make a copy of it. DVD drives in computers are often better quality and can sometimes read a disc that a DVD or bluray player can't.

Regardless, keep trying different drives until you find one that can. As crazy as it sounds, on occasion even a cheap-o $20 DVD player can play something back that a $100 player can't.

The data may be lost forever, but you do still have a chance of getting it back if you try this.

Posted by Paul Adsett (Member # 25) on April 02, 2016, 08:07 PM:

The computer does not want to copy the files over from the dvd, but the computers DVD drive will play back certain sections of the disc, but locks upon others. Looks like quite a lot of it is still ok. Is there anyway that I can re-record these good sections in real time as I play them back on the computer?

Posted by Kenneth Horan (Member # 3) on April 02, 2016, 09:28 PM:

Paul, If the computer reads the disc you should be able to copy the VIDEO_TS folder. Have you tried to just copy the individual VOB files? If for some unknown reason you can't, then try another computer and drive. FYI you can copy video in real time with a screen capture program. I use Snapz Pro X for Mac. I'm sure there's a similar program for a Windows machine.

Posted by Janice Glesser (Member # 2758) on April 02, 2016, 11:20 PM:

Paul...directly copying files off a DVD can be problematic. I recommend using a DVD ripping/copying program. If there are sector problems you might get an error message...but usually the files will transfer.

A couple free PC programs I have used for copying DVDs are:

If one doesn't work try the other.

DVDSmith Movie Backup
http://www.dvdsmith.com/dvdsmith-movie-backup.html

DVD Dycrypter
http://www.dvddecrypter.org.uk/

Posted by Paul Adsett (Member # 25) on April 03, 2016, 11:24 AM:

Thanks to everyone for your help and suggestions. I tried Brad's tip of trying another DVD player, with no success. But...I tried my Blu Ray player and it played back fine, except for two lockups which the player successfully advanced through. Using the BR player I was able to re-record onto a new disc using my DVD camcorder.
So these precious memories have been saved just in time!

Posted by Janice Glesser (Member # 2758) on April 03, 2016, 12:16 PM:

Good to hear Paul. However, to be on the safe-side I would backup the re-recorded DVD to your PC. DVD's recorded on those camcorder burners can have problems playing on some players. Use the DVDSmith program I suggested above. It's easy to use and free. You'll be glad you did [Smile]

Posted by Paul Adsett (Member # 25) on April 03, 2016, 01:51 PM:

Thanks so much Janice, I will try that program out.
As a result of this incident I realize now that I have a huge task ahead of me. I need to convert about 60 digital8 tapes to computer files and dvd's.
More work than editing film! [Big Grin]

Posted by Mark Silvester (Member # 929) on April 05, 2016, 03:14 AM:

Hi Paul

Janice is tight.

DVD decrypter is great for ripping then you can just re-author. It is pretty simple.

[Smile]

Posted by William Olson (Member # 2083) on April 05, 2016, 09:35 AM:

For whatever reason, those Mini-DVD camcorders created discs that, over time, don't play even on the camcorder that created them - even if they had been finalized. It seems the Mini-DVD camcorder is n ot a good format.

Posted by John Hourigan (Member # 111) on April 05, 2016, 09:46 AM:

Yes, those DVD recorders were definitely a flawed technology.

Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on April 05, 2016, 11:53 AM:

That's it Andrew, rub it in! [Big Grin]

When it comes to old video format's, even though old VHS can occasionally get "video scratches" and all, you CAN transfer them rather well, and then do restoration on the footage. I bought something (can't remember what it is called off hand), but it allows for full frame by frame copying in the AVI format, and while it takes up a lot of space, I'd swear that it looks better than I ever watched it.

Just a thought, could that error message be due to the actual digital camera, and not the disc? That is sometimes the issue. I had a hell of a time tracking down a good mini digital camcorder for transferring my videos a few years back.

You know what is harder to find than the actual mini-digital camercorders? The bloody camera cleaning cassettes that they used to market for these specific cameras, as the main problem with them, is that the digital heads tend to be dirty and won't playback properly.

Posted by Paul Adsett (Member # 25) on April 05, 2016, 12:54 PM:

My digital 8 tapes from the 1990's still play back fine, and even if there were a bad spot you could simply wind through it. My 8cm camcorder DVD'S seem to be much more problematic. Like all DVD'S they just seem to shut down completely if there is a disc fault anywhere on the disc. So yes I believe the statement, made on the other thread, that video tape will outlast DVD.

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