Could someone tell me the cause of pixelation and poor image quality on burned dvds? Is is errors/bad scratches from the original/downloaded content/bad media?? perhaps most of the above? I had a burned dvd recently loaned to me that had awful pixelation and ended up stopping on my player I did not even bother trying to burn it for myself. are there any particular causes? any solutions? If my discs are not a fair quality I bin them. would be interested on anyone elses opinions and wisdom
Ok first off i would like to know what type of blank media you are using? The way to find that out is by using a program called DVD Identifier. DVD Identifier http://www.afterdawn.com/software/video_software/dvd_tools/dvd_identifier.cfm and my second question is at what speed did you burn the movie at??
For best playback: You want your backup discs to be the best that is possible-with few errors- PIE/PIF 1) Quality media-very critical.Genuine Taiyo Yuden,Verbatim,and Maxell Hitachi are some of the finest brands of media. 2) Quality burner. Up to date firmware. There's some crappy drives out there- HP, LOL. 3) Burn Speed. Burn at half the rated speed. If using 16x media,burn it at 8x. Quality drive,then you can increase that. Crap drive,then you'll probably have to slow it down. 4) Burn Engines: There's quite a bit of difference between burn programs. 5) Programs transfering AVI,Bittorrent,etc into dvd. 6) No paper/sticker labels 7) No multi-tasking 8) Do not burn all the way to the outer edge of disc.Keep backup target at 4360 mbs with quality media.Crap media,take it down to 4300 mbs. If someone gives you a crappy backup,chances are you'll get another crappy backup if you rip it. The first copy needs to have as few of errors as possible. Too many errors,or errors in the wrong spot-then you'll most likely get a crc error.
My backups are high quality I do most of what was recommended... just wondering why other peoples burns are so poor quality with the awful pixelation? I had two more loaned last night and they look like sand-paper was taken to them so scratched. No way I'm even going to put them in my burner. sorry for the misunderstanding my burns are okay just trying to find the cause of friends bad burns? I just wish my friends would look after the media better and perhaps learn to burn a little lol.
It's very difficult to control other people's backups. Some people don't think anything about media quality,burn speed,paper/sticker labels.They want to get the job done as fast and cheap as possible. But wait till a year or so later when they need another copy of it and bam-major crc errors and unrippable. Burner quality another factor.All burners are different.Some put out some awesome backups,and some put out total crap backups.. Having found this out with 3 of my other drives: I/O Magic,Khypermedia,HP 640c.
I've always been a perfectionist when it came to burning audio so I figure the same with dvd make a decent copy or not at all. someone told me yesterday the pixelation is caused by compression and playback on a different source but I think I believe you about the burner themselves and methods. sorry it took me a couple days to get back to this post Saugmon
If using quality media,standard 4-8x burn,then the issues with highly compressed backups will give your playback a square block look. Not quite pixellation,but you'll see the square blockiness in the background,as well as a little hazier picture. The AEC qualilty enhancements of dvd shrink help out on that issue- Max Smoothness/Max Sharpness.
thankyou for that info in your opinion would you actually put a scratched dvd-r+r in your burner that looks like it was sandpapered lol? I don't want to put my new burner under that potential strain. any advice? I have this theory with cd-players that they last longer without putting them through scratched media don't know if that applies to dvd players and burners look at the rental shops I guess alot of scratched discs get played
I clean every disc that goes into any of my drives-scratched or perfect new.I've ripped some pretty nasty scratched dvds,while some of the ones with minor scratches were impossible. Any trouble and that crc error will pop up. Those scratches haven't affected my equipment. My backup copies are the only discs I play on my stand alone player-making sure they look perfect.My $30 walmart special player will play everything I slap in her. If I can get a good year's worth out of her,then I'm happy. I notice how playback issues rise with the more wear and tear on the stand alone players. My quality plextor and benq drives,I perform no ripping or playing on them. They are strictly for burning. I'm using my original Benq 1620 to do the ripping on my backup pc,and the HP drive to do the ripping on my main pc. The ripping is what puts the most wear and tear on a drive and shortens the life of it. Rental shops: Most people renting from those places don't give a crap about the discs. They scratch the hell out of it,finger it all up,and even get food all over them.Years ago,I got a hold of 1 of them that had a huge flake chip out of it-about the size of a nickel-so I didn't even think about throwing that into my player.
saugmon I learned from your opinion thankyou. always nice to bounce ideas off people. DVD players are so cheap now I think a years worth is fine too. I have a very cheap player but it does the job. I leave my dvd burner for burning only too. sometimes I burn audio cd-r on it mainly because at the moment not burning a heap of dvds I'd prefer to play the movies on my stand-alone and save the burners laser for burns I think that is what you meant? anyway, thanks for the chat and opinion cheers
