I recently made some backups of my laserdiscs to DVD, but soon after discovered that a few of the DVDs had large dark spots on them. Upon checking the forum I discovered that other people have had success both writing and playing such discs, but I think I want to make new copies just in case.
So, as long as the software (in this case DVD Decrypter) reads and writes the discs correctly, will the data (in this case video) stay intact during the transfer? Or, will the dark spots manifest themselves (jitters, stutters etc) on the actual film even though the burner and software didn't report any problems?
As a side note, Laserdisc is an analog format and just presents a white line or something else when the player cannot read the content, but seeing DVD as digital format, shouldn't I get read errors during the copying process? I really don't want to spend hours upon hours copying the laserdiscs again...
There should be no dark spots on a DVD before or after recording. Such spots indicate physical flaws which can worsen over time and cause fatal errors even if the error correction can correct any errors now.
Rings of darker areas are not the same thing. They indicate a change in recording power during recording and may or may not indicate a problem. They are often simply just cosmetic changes without any serious problem.
Because digital data on a DVD are redundant, the computer processor can reassemble information from several areas or even attempt at a guess when there is a physical flaw on a medium. (When green pixels show up on the screen, the guess was obviously wrong.) Analogue media cannot distinguish physical flaws from the information.
If the dark spots are on the DVDs and the discs can be read, simply copy the data to another DVD. There is no need to re-encode the entire LD information unless the DVD flaw is so severe that the data cannot be read.
Thanks! I'll take your advice and back the discs up. However, I must say I'm a bit surprised that as many as about 20 discs out of 50 had these spots after recording. I even used genuine TY 8x DVD media... =/ Can I trust the ok-looking discs from the same batch?
Originally posted by Rablador: Thanks! I'll take your advice and back the discs up. However, I must say I'm a bit surprised that as many as about 20 discs out of 50 had these spots after recording. I even used genuine TY 8x DVD media... =/ Can I trust the ok-looking discs from the same batch?
What kind of TY are those (Value Line, Premium Line, or rebranded)? Did you try checking the disc for any flaws in the dye before you recorded them? In my experience, disc that have flaws in the dye will exhibit these symptoms when burn. I have encountered this problem before with the TY value line.
They were "That's" 8x DVDs, made for video recording and bought in Japan, so they should be good. I didn't check the surface before copying since I had about 50 discs to copy ^_^;. Can I trust the discs that looks ok? Maybe the whole batch is bad...
