My experience with Verify option

[grampaw]

Now that DL media prices are getting reasonable, I thought I try experimenting. I took two DVDs, extracted one title from each, then created an ISO image - used Shrink reauthor mode to do this. Then I opened up ImgBurn, let it figure out L0 - L1 breakpoint (there was no MDS file), and then burned the DVD using a Pioneer DVR 108 burner. I left the ISO file on the HDD and I used RIDATA DL blank (RicohJPND000-01) for the media.

 

I then played the DVD on both of my ancient (4 year old) players - one a Pioneer DV 440, and the other a Toshiba SD 1800. The Toshiba played start to end flawessly, the Pioneer started fine then froze right about where I'd guess the breakpoint is - a touch of FF, then Play, got me past that point and it played fine to the end.

 

Continuing my experiment, I figured I'd try ImgBurn verify since I've never used that option. The verify bombed out about a quarter of the way into the DVD, nowhere near the breakpoint and seemingly not related to anything at that point during playback.

 

So I have a DL burned disk playable on my two players (with a little help on one). However it doesn't pass the ImgBurn verify test. Aside from the fact I have an ancient burner, ancient players, and probably questionable DL media, can any advise me what's going on? Should I just do the real world verify on the burned disks (i.e. play them) and skip the ImgBurn verify test?

[zacoz]

As I understand it, in the latest version the verify option does a true bit for bit verify against the source ISO. So a single bit being unable to be read correctly during the verify will cause a verify failure. When it comes to playing on your standalone or PC for that matter, they are more forgiving and ignore it or try to correct it, then keep going - you won't be able to pick a single bit error within the video or audio in most cases.

 

Personally if verify is failing your should consider slowing the burn speed, using better quality disc etc - if you get one bit failure, dependant upon the cause (e.g. CMC dye discs) it may be just as likely you'll get 1000.

[LIGHTNING UK!]

Check your PC drives firmware is up to date.

 

Clearly it 'should' be able to read the discs back too.

 

Where you say it 'bombed out', did you get an I/O Error or just a miscompare?

 

3rd party DVD related apps running in the background will/can cause verify to fail - because they're changing the data read from the drive on the fly. As such, these programs must be disabled.

[grampaw]

Check your PC drives firmware is up to date.

 

Clearly it 'should' be able to read the discs back too.

 

Where you say it 'bombed out', did you get an I/O Error or just a miscompare?

 

3rd party DVD related apps running in the background will/can cause verify to fail - because they're changing the data read from the drive on the fly. As such, these programs must be disabled.

 

Ooh, bad term - "bombed out." My apologies. I meant a standard sector "miscompare."

 

I'll update the Pioneer Burner FW, it is the original which works fine with SL TY media. Or maybe I'll finally get around to swapping out to the BENQ 1430 I bought that's been sitting on the shelf for a couple of weeks. And I'll get some Verbatim DL media.

 

I never tried to play the burned disk on the computer - that's usually my third option after the stand-alone players (it has a 22" CRT and DD 5.1) I'll give it a try.

 

I always reboot computer before burning any DVD with any software app - then I'm sure nothing is running but WinXP OS and that all memory, buffers, etc. are all clear/clean or whatever. I know, that's way over-kill.

 

As for the ImgBurn verify, I guess a "miscompare" means the burned disk is not an exact copy, which in turn may or may not mean the disk is unplayable. The proof is in the pudding...

 

Thanks for your suggestions

[LIGHTNING UK!]

By 3rd party apps, I was referring to AnyDVD / DVD43.

 

So long as you're sure you don't have those enabled, there is no reason for failure so long as the disc really isn't broken.