alt.video.dvd Frequently Asked Questions

alt.video.dvd
Frequently Asked Questions
Last Updated 6/14/04

Where can I get this FAQ?
The most current version is on the Web at:
http://aww-faq.org/dvdfaq.html

What is the purpose of alt.video.dvd?
Discussion of DVD hardware and software for computers
and home entertainment systems; also information and
entertainment (movies) released on DVD.

Can I advertise in alt.video.dvd?
All advertising, whether "on-topic" or not, is subject
to being reported to the sender's ISP and/or web host.

Advertising is:
- Any offer to sell or trade.
- Any message designed to drive traffic to the
sender's web site.
- Any message designed to generate email responses.

A 4-line or less "sig" attached to a legitimate
question or comment is not considered advertising.

What is DVD?
DVD stands for Digital Versatile Disk. It is a
multi-purpose technology suited to both entertainment
and computer uses.

A DVD is identical in thickness (1.2 millimeters) and
diameter (120 millimeters or 4.7 inches) to a standard
Compact Disc, but that's where the similarities end.
The DVD's storage capacity is seven times that of a
CD, with a 4.7-gigabyte capacity on a
single-side/single-layer DVD. That's the data-storage
equivalent of a 133-minute movie, thus allowing 95
percent of all movies to fit comfortably on a
single-layer DVD, eliminating the need for "flipping"
the disc and leaving extra room for multiple audio,
language, and subtitle tracks; bonus materials; menu
screens; and other features unique to DVD. This
capacity is nearly doubled (8.5 GB) on a
single-side/dual-layer DVD, and quadrupled (17 GB) on
a double-side/dual-layer DVD, allowing DVD to flourish
not only as a movie-lover's format, but as an
amazingly flexible medium (DVD-ROM) for
high-definition computer games and multimedia
applications. In short, this makes DVD the home
entertainment and multimedia format of the new
millennium.

What are the features of DVD-Video?
The main features of the various DVD formats are:
- Backwards compatibility with current CD media.
- All DVD hardware will play audio CDs and CD-ROMs
- Physical dimensions identical to compact disc but
using two 0.6 mm thick substrates, bonded together.
- Single-layer/dual-layer and single/double sided
options.
- Up to 4.7 GB read-only capacity per layer, 8.5 GB
per side maximum.
- Designed from the outset for video, audio and
multimedia, not just audio.
- All formats use a common file system (UDF).
- Digital and analog copy protection for DVD-Video
and DVD-Audio built into standard.
- Recordable and re-writable versions.

Not only do movies look great on DVD, but they also
include lots of interesting additional material and
interactive options. The DVD format was designed from
the beginning to support interactive features
including menus and indexing, alternate audio and
video tracks, and even user-controlled branching
within the material.

Most movies also include additional material such as
movie trailers and behind-the-scene documentaries, and
sometimes additional scenes that were cut from the
movie. DVD's can provide support for the hard of
hearing and for alternate languages.

The alternate audio track also is often used for a
director's commentary, in which the entire movie is
accompanied by voice-over discussion by the creative
team, describing their thinking while it was being
created and edited.

Some DVD's also provide multiple camera angles for the
video, so you can switch points of view as it plays.

Why is the quality of DVD-Video so much better than
VHS?
DVD has the capability to produce near-studio-quality
video and better-than-CD-quality audio. DVD is vastly
superior to videotape. However, quality depends on
many production factors.

DVD's will usually (but not always, see dvd rot) last
much longer than videotape.

Will DVD replace VCRs?
Eventually. DVD has many advantages over VCRs,
including fundamentally lower technology cost for
hardware and disc production.

What is MPEG?
DVD video is compressed from studio CCIR-601 format to
MPEG-2 format. This is a "lossy" compression which
attempts to remove redundant information (such as
sections of the picture that don't change) and
information that's not readily perceptible by the
human eye. The resulting video, especially when it is
complex or changing quickly, may sometimes contain
"artifacts" such as blockiness or fuzziness. It
depends entirely on the quality of compression and
how heavily the video is compressed. At average rates
of 3.5 Mb/s (megabits/second), artifacts may be
occasionally noticeable. Higher data rates result in
higher quality, with almost no perceptible difference
from the original master at rates above
6 Mb/s. As MPEG compression technology improves,
better quality will be achieved at lower rates.

MPEG-4 is the current state-of-the-art for video
compression technology. The two older technologies
MPEG-1 and MPEG-2 already caused a widespread
distribution of digital video on the PC and notebook.
The successor of MPEG-4 is already on the horizon and
is called MPEG-7. This video standard principally
integrates an object search routine. MPEG-2 will also
be extended; MPEG-21 is the succeeding standard.

What are "regional codes," "country codes," or "zone
locks"?
Motion picture studios demanded that the DVD standard
include codes which can be used to prevent playback of
certain discs in certain geographical regions. Players
sold in each region will have that region's code built
into the player. The player will refuse to play discs
which are not allowed in the region. This means that
discs bought in one country may not play on players
bought in another country.

Regional codes are entirely optional. Discs without
codes will play on any player in any country. It's not
an encryption system, it's just one byte of
information on the disc that the player checks. Some
studios have already announced that only their new
releases will have regional codes. Presumably, once a
DVD movie has achieved worldwide release it could be
re-released without encoding.

There are 6 regions:
- North America
- Europe
- Japan
- Australia & Far East (except Japan)
- Africa & Middle East
- Central & South America

I tried to copy a DVD. Why didn't it work?
Copying DVD's is prohibited by the DMCA (Digital
Millennium Copyright Act) and usually prevented with a
Macrovision (or equivalent) circuit in every DVD
player. Composite video output will have a rapidly
modulated colorburst signal along with pulses in the
vertical blanking signal to confuse the
automatic-recording-level circuitry of VCRs.
Unfortunately, this can degrade the picture,
especially with old or nonstandard equipment.

Macrovision is designed to guard against casual
copying (which the studios claim causes billions of
dollars in lost revenue), but it doesn't stop pirates.

What is the DMCA?
The DMCA is the Digital Millennium Copyright Act,
passed by the U.S. Congress in 1998, supposedly to
update copyright law for electronic commerce and
electronic content providers. Unfortunately, this law
is very poorly written, and is now regularly used by
corporations to restrain the three primary concessions
of copyright and otherwise prevent free speech
activity:

1. Fair use is the right to make unauthorized copies
of works for certain protected purposes - mainly for
academics, reporting, or criticism. When a student
quotes a book in a high school paper, she is making a
fair use, and can't be stopped by the copyright owner.

2. First sale is the right to sell purchased media
over and over again, as long as you don't make any
copies. When you read a book, then sell it to a used
book store to be bought and read by someone else,
you're exercising your rights under first sale.

3. Limited time - copyrights are granted for a limited
time. After that time expires, the work goes into the
public domain - it can be copied and used by anyone,
for any reason.

The DMCA has one particularly bad section, called the
anti-circumvention provision. That section makes it a
crime to break encryption used to prevent someone from
getting access to electronic content, or to "traffic"
in a tool used to do so.

A friend told me that if you cover the inner ring of a
DVD with a black marker, you will disable the
Macrovision. Is this true?
No, you can't disable Macrovision that way.

There is an audio-CD copy protection that can be
disabled that way - the disc contains phony data to
throw off CD-ROM players so they can't read the CD.
Audio-CD players will in theory not try to read that
data and ignore it but some are affected anyway. The
fake data is indeed located on the inner ring and can
be made unreadable by using a marker.

Is there a noticeable difference in the Superbit
version of a movie...?
The whole "point" of Superbit is to have superior
sound and video quality for the movie. If you compare
a superbit version with a non-superbit version,
chances are, superbit is better quality, even if there
are no extras... but now the studio seems to be
getting into "Superbit Deluxe" where one disc is a
high-quality video/audio transfer of the film, and the
second disc is a bunch of extras.

It takes good equipment to appreciate the difference.
Like a really good player (Pioneer Elite, Philips,
Marantz, Onkyo, etc.), good cabling, and an HDTV.

HDTV's, particularly 16x9 HDTV's, can not only show
the full resolution that a DVD sends, but can also
engage an anamorphic mode which delivers 2-3 times the
resolution normally allowed. With this kind of
resolution available, the improved quality of Superbit
can be seen.

What happens if I scratch the disc?
DVD includes a better error-correction system than CD.
Most scratches will cause minor raw data errors that
are easily corrected. Major scratches may cause
anything from unrecoverable errors that will show up
as a momentary glitch in the picture to a complete
failure.

Is CD-ROM compatible with DVD-ROM?
Yes. All DVD-ROM drives will read CD-ROMs (Yellow
Book). However, DVD-ROMs are not readable by CD-ROM
drives.

Will DVD support Digital TV (HDTV)?
HTDV is not supported by DVD, but the designers have
it in mind. Since HDTV uses MPEG-2 it will be easy to
"upgrade" the DVD format. The limited data rate of DVD
may make it difficult to support high-quality HDTV,
but this can be solved by either increasing the spin
rate (as with multi-speed CD-ROM drives) or
using higher-capacity blue lasers.

Some have speculated that a "double-headed" player
reading both sides of the disc at the same time could
double the data rate. This is impossible since the
track spirals go in opposite directions. The DVD specs
would have to be changed to allow reverse spirals on
the second side.

What are the outputs of a DVD player?
Most DVD players will have the following output
connections:
Video:
- RCA composite video (NTSC or PAL)
- S-video (NTSC or PAL)
Audio:
- Dual RCA stereo analog audio (with Pro LLogic)
- Digital audio (coaxial FM and/or IEC-9588 optical).
Requires an external decoder or an amplifier/receiver
with built-in Dolby Digital or MPEG-2 audio or
PCM stereo) support.

Some players may have additional connections:
- Component (YCrCb; NTSC or PAL)
- RF video output for connecting to TV witthout direct
input. (Panasonic DVD-A300)
- 6 RCA jacks for surround sound output frrom built-in
decoder. (Panasonic DVD-A300, RCA.)

What are the sizes and capacities of DVD?
There are many variations on the DVD theme. There are
two physical sizes: 12 cm (4.7 inches) and 8 cm (3.1
inches), both 1.2 mm thick. This is the same form
factor as CD. A disc can be single-sided or
double-sided. Each side can have one or two layers of
data. The amount of video a disc can hold depends on
how much audio accompanies it and how heavily the
video and audio are compressed. The oft-quoted figure
of 133 minutes is apocryphal: a standard DVD can
actually hold up to 6 hours of video and audio if it's
heavily compressed (which reduces the quality).

What are aspect ratios?
Video can be stored on a DVD in 4:3 format (standard
TV shape) or 16:9 (widescreen). The 16:9 format is
"anamorphic," meaning the picture is squeezed
horizontally to fit a 4:3 rectangle then unsqueezed
during playback. DVD players output widescreen video
in three different ways:

- letterbox (for 4:3 screens)
- pan & scan (for 4:3 screens)
- anamorphic or unchanged (for wide screens)

Note: Some 16:9 discs are playable in widescreen and
letterbox modes only, if the producer chooses.

For letterbox mode the player uses a "letterbox
filter" that creates black bars at the top and the
bottom of the picture (60 lines each for NTSC, 72 for
PAL). This leaves 3/4 of the height remaining,
creating a shorter but wider rectangle. In order to
fit this shorter rectangle, the picture is squeezed
vertically by combining every 4 lines into 3. This
compensates for the original horizontal squeezing,
resulting in the movie being shown in its full width.

For pan & scan mode the video is unsqueezed to 16:9
and a portion of the image is shown at full height on
a 4:3 screen by following "center of interest"
coordinates that are encoded in the video stream
according to the preferences of the people who
transferred the film to video.

For anamorphic mode the video is stretched back out by
widescreen equipment to its original width.

In widescreen or letterbox mode if a movie is wider
than 16:9 (and most are), additional thin black bars
will be added to the top and bottom at production time
or the sides may be cropped (possibly with a small
amount of additional panning).

Video stored in 4:3 format is not changed by the
player. It will appear normally on a 4:3 screen.
Widescreen systems will either stretch it horizontally
or add black bars to the sides.

Some producers may put 16:9 source on one side of the
disc and 4:3 source on the other, since "full-frame"
4:3 movies have additional picture at the top and
bottom rather than panning and scanning. (The
cinematographer has two sets of frame marks in his
viewfinder, one for 4:3 and one for 1.85, so he can
allow for both formats).

The 16:9 anamorphic format causes no problems with
line doublers, since they simply double the lines on
their way to the widescreen display which then
stretches out the lines.

What is progressive scan?
One of the primary tasks of the MPEG decoder inside
every DVD player is to take the 24 fps data stored on
the DVD and convert it to 60-fields-per-second video
for TV viewing. Since 24 doesn't divide evenly into
60, a process called "3-2 pulldown" is employed, where
3 video fields are created from the first film frame,
then 2 fields from the next frame, then 3, then 2,
3-2-3-2-3-2, etc. The result is 60-fields-per-second
interlaced-scan video, and that's the end of the story
for non-progressive-scan DVD players.

Progressive-scan DVD players add an important
additional step to create a better-looking picture
they generate a progressive-scan video signal through
a process called de-interlacing (sometimes called
"line-doubling"). The de-interlacer's first task is to
look at the interlaced video signal as it leaves the
MPEG decoder and determine whether its original source
was 24-frame-per-second film or 30-frame-per-second
video. The original frame rate determines the type of
processing necessary to create an optimized
progressive-scan signal.

What is "DVD rot?"
DVD rot makes discs unplayable by impairing the
ability of their aluminum layer to reflect light. Its
most likely causes include oxidation caused by air
coming into contact with the reflective layer, a
galvanic reaction between a dual-layer disc's gold and
aluminum coatings, and a chemical reaction triggered
by impurities in either the disc's adhesive or in the
aluminum itself.

The vast majority of reported cases of DVD rot have
been shown to be due to poor quality control during
the manufacturing process or user mishandling. DVD's
are a delicate audio/video/data storage device that is
held together by a laminated outer surface containing
layers of plastic and reflective metal coatings, and
held together by special glues.

If manufactured with proper quality control at the
production line end, placed and removed properly from
its storage case when used, and stored properly by the
consumer, DVDs will definitely outlive their video
tape counterparts.

How can I convert some of my old home movies on VHS
and 8mm to DVD?
The "Guides" section of http://www.doom9.org/ has all
the information you need on this and many other DVD
topics.

Where can I learn how to burn my own DVD's?
http://www.videohelp.com/

I just got a DVD player and it pauses, skips and
pixilates a lot when I'm trying to watch a movie. What
causes that?
If you are having these problems on more than one disc
it's probably the DVD player. Inexpensive or
"throw-away" players are much less reliable than
higher-priced (>$100) models.

Where can I find the best prices for movies on DVD?
http://dvdpricesearch.com

Which is the best video connection to use; RF,
composite, S-video or component?
Assuming you use decent quality cables, component
video is the best.
Ranked by quality from worst to best;
- RF
- Composite
- S-video
- Component

Where can I download movies off the net?
A reputable on-line retailer. You "upload" your CC
info, and then you can "download" all the movies you
want. Downloading commercial movies without paying is
illegal.

--
dvdfaq

dvdfaq

FagMeister wrote:
> alt.video.dvd
> Frequently Asked Questions
> Last Updated 6/14/04
>
> Where can I get this FAQ?

Why are you the only one still asking this question, you retard.

Joe Liquor wrote:
> Why are you the only one still asking this question, you retard.

Because he thinks that the rest of us cares about his silly
little FAQ. The best thing we can do is ignore him. He
will go away eventually after he realizes that he's not getting
the attention he so longs for.

--
Brian The Demolition Man Little
TNAImpact.com Columnist & Message Board Mod
Want "Fullscreen DVDs"... Buy VHS and get your
filthy hands off of my Widescreen DVD! Widescreen.org

"Brian The Demolition Man Little" <> wrote in message
news:mrGdnTZ4_dk4eX3dRVn-
> Joe Liquor wrote:
>> Why are you the only one still asking this question, you retard.
>
> Because he thinks that the rest of us cares about his silly
> little FAQ. The best thing we can do is ignore him. He
> will go away eventually after he realizes that he's not getting
> the attention he so longs for.

<Yawn>
--
Buford T. Justice
The alt.video.dvd faq is located at:
http://www.geocities.com/altvideodvd/

Joe Liquor wrote:

> FagMeister wrote:
>
>> alt.video.dvd
>> Frequently Asked Questions
>> Last Updated 6/14/04
>>
>> Where can I get this FAQ?
>
>
> Why are you the only one still asking this question, you retard.
>
he wants to drive people to his web site.

dick
-- he's a spammer

>> will go away eventually after he realizes that he's not getting
>> the attention he so longs for.
>
><Yawn>

Next time you decide to troll, try not making it so incredibly transparent, you
rank amateur.

Joe Liquor wrote:
> FagMeister wrote:
>
>> alt.video.dvd
>> Frequently Asked Questions
>> Last Updated 6/14/04
>>
>> Where can I get this FAQ?
>
>
> Why are you the only one still asking this question, you retard.
>

I guess I'm missing something, why does everybody on this group hate
this guy?

--

"If you examined a hundred people who had lost their faith in
Christianity, I wonder how many of them would turn out to have reasoned
out of it by honest argument? Do not most people simply drift away?"

--C.S. Lewis

Grand Inquisitor wrote:
> Joe Liquor wrote:
>
>> FagMeister wrote:
>>
>>> alt.video.dvd
>>> Frequently Asked Questions
>>> Last Updated 6/14/04
>>>
>>> Where can I get this FAQ?
>>
>> Why are you the only one still asking this question, you retard.
>>
> I guess I'm missing something, why does everybody on this group hate
> this guy?

A couple weeks ago he came in all full of hot air and pretensions that
he was going to "clean up" spamming in this newsgroup by introducing his
own "FAQ" cribbed together from other sources with specifics regarding
various useless "rules" to quote when complaining to so-called spammer's
ISPs. Instead of targeting true spammers, he complained about several
dvd reviewers who'd post links here about reviews on their respective
websites. Of course, nothing happened and after about a week of mostly
whining and comical proclamations, he caved in and said he'd give up his
mighty mission! Now he occasionally changes his user name as if he
believes he's sneaking under the radar.

Then again, the short answer would be that it's fun ragging on him.

"Grand Inquisitor" <> wrote in message
news:cIcEc.173027$
> Joe Liquor wrote:
>> FagMeister wrote:
>>
>>> alt.video.dvd
>>> Frequently Asked Questions
>>> Last Updated 6/14/04
>>>
>>> Where can I get this FAQ?
>>
>>
>> Why are you the only one still asking this question, you retard.
>>
>
> I guess I'm missing something, why does everybody on this group hate
> this guy?

Since "certain people" can't resist lying about what I said and what I
tried to do, here is what I actually said:

Date: Tue, 8 Jun 2004
Message-ID: <ca50vh$slq$>
Subject: It's time to take back this group from the spammers
> This newsgroup's charter does not specifically permit advertising.
> Therefore advertising is not permitted. This group hasn't had a FAQ
> for over six years, so a new FAQ has now been posted that includes a
> policy on advertising.
>
> Effective 6/12/04, I will begin reporting all advertising posted in
> this group to the sender's ISP and/or web host. If that doesn't work,
> I'll go after any affiliate links I find on the sender's web site.
>
> I've decided to do this after reading this group for several months
> and being totally fed up with the endless stream of worthless review
> announcements posted by a few individuals. They have been getting away
> with it for a long time because no one has tried to stop them.
>
> I urge everyone who wants to help reduce the spam and put an end to
> the ridiculous review announcements to join me in reporting everyone
> who advertises in this group starting this Friday. It'll be up to the
> poster's service providers whether any action is taken, so the more
> complaints that are received the better the chance of stopping the
> selfish bastards whose only interest in this group is using it as an
> advertising medium to promote their businesses.
>
> To those who claim they like the review announcements, I say check the
> web sites periodically if you like the reviews so much. Some say the
> "off topic" conversations are worse. Maybe, but that's "free speech"
> and at least they're not using this group to enrich themselves. And
> before anyone says it, note that "free speech" on usenet doesn't
> include any right to advertise.
>
> Thanks in advance to anyone who helps me with this.
>
> If you don't agree with this course of action, that's OK. You can take
> the same advice you offered to me. You can just ignore it.

Here is what I did:

I filed lots of complaints and urged others to do the same. Some
spammers were stopped, but unfortunately the "link spammers" who post
nearly every day were able to defend themselves against the complaints
by proving that they have been spamming this group for a long time. So
yes, I failed to stop them. After that I decided to quit reporting any
spammers and I made a public statement to that effect.

This group hasn't had a FAQ in over six years so I put together a useful
FAQ and started posting it. Some people resented that as well, even
though I've explained many times that anyone can write a FAQ for an alt
group, there is no such thing as an official FAQ for an alt group, and
that alt group FAQs have no authority.

Several childish losers tried playing their little troll-poking games
hoping to annoy me into making mistakes so that they could netkop me.
Most quit after a short while but there are still a few who continue to
post flames or whine about the FAQ.

Though I lost the battle over spam, the FAQ I wrote is decent and not
anything like how some have portrayed it. It is a useful reference and I
will continue to post it once a week. If you or anyone else has any
reasonable suggestions for corrections or improvements I'd like to hear
them.

--
Buford T. Justice
The alt.video.dvd faq is located at:
http://aww-faq.org/dvdfaq.html

FAGmeister wrote:

(snip)

> Here is what I did:
>
> I filed lots of complaints and urged others to do the same. Some
> spammers were stopped...

I'm interested in hearing exactly which spammer(s) have been stopped
posting "spam" here. Can you name one? If you know that "some" have been
stopped, surely you can name one.

See, the thing is with "FAQmeister, is that he wants to cause trouble
and desires attention. Obviously a guy like me who rags on him
relentlessly is cut from the same cloth so to speak but I don't have any
hangups about saying, "yeah, I like messing with this pretentious ****"
whereas FAQie tries to make it look like he's doing something noble and
grand for the good of everyone here at a.v.dvd.