Does using my DVD player to load AVIs damage it?

[Azrael Strife]

I've recently downloaded a bunch of episodes of an animated series I've been unable to get the actual discs (only got to buy one cuarter of Season 3..), so I'm wondering if burning the AVIs into a DVD and loading it with my DVD player can cause any damage on it? I vaguely recall reading that it did damage it, but considering the source I am hesitant to believe it (it was in some panflets against DVD piracy, and they as everyone else try to play with the ignorance of people on technical issues).

 

Anyone know?

[Strong Bob]

Uhm, from what I know about DVD players...

 

The mechanics are not much different from CD players. Basically a laser is used to read the optical data. I don't think a DVD player is designed to recieve programming data from a disc of any kind, but that is not my forte.

 

I strongly do not think your DVD player will come to harm. However, I also doubt you will have much success in playing the DVD, since just putting .AVIs onto it isn't the way to do it. (I do not know how to code a DVD to be read in an everyday player, unfortunately.)

[Azrael Strife]

Uhm, from what I know about DVD players...

 

The mechanics are not much different from CD players. Basically a laser is used to read the optical data. I don't think a DVD player is designed to recieve programming data from a disc of any kind, but that is not my forte.

 

I strongly do not think your DVD player will come to harm. However, I also doubt you will have much success in playing the DVD, since just putting .AVIs onto it isn't the way to do it. (I do not know how to code a DVD to be read in an everyday player, unfortunately.)

 

I've already burned some AVI episodes on a RW DVD it works, just wondering about the safety of my reader.

[zaimoni]

I've already burned some AVI episodes on a RW DVD it works, just wondering about the safety of my reader.

From a data-format point of view: perfectly safe, barring truly exotic firmware bugs in the codecs. There are a number of format standards (Microsoft-ish) that explicitly allow AVIs as a low-level format for DVD video. [Depending on the format standard, any of about ten major video formats extant in 2002 are legitimate. There may have been extensions to this since then, that's just how recent the data I could find when researching this in 2005 was.]

[Matri]

You referring to the MPAA ad that cautioned against pirated movies because they contain no anti-theft message, no rootkits and are easily copyable onto other media formats?

 

All sarcasm aside (at them, not you), the possibility of said damage occuring is negligible to the point of being preposterous. All players operate in Read-Only mode, and even if reprogramming is possible it is always a "return to factory" method. Add to the fact that the operating firmware of these players are widely different according to brands and series, and you'd have to be one ridiculously determined virus writer to create something like this.

 

Besides, Nero Recode as well as several other programs available commercially and freely are able to convert most video formats into into native VCD/SVCD/DVD format. This process of re-encoding will strip any viral code hiding in the movie. In fact, you're in more danger with legitimate media than pirated media. The Sony BMG rootkit fiasco, and the StarForce protection scheme which has been proven to cause irreversible damage to burner drives. This scaremongering tactic is just an attempt to deflect all the problems DRM has caused consumers and transfer the blame elsewhere.

 

Newer players should have no problems playing most video files. My player is about a couple or so years old, and it is perfectly capable of playing AVI, MPG, WMV and DivX/Xvid files. Any damage you sustain is most likely caused by either human error or a damaged disc physically damaging the lens. Any self-respecting player would handle damaged files in a graceful manner and simply not play it.

[Azrael Strife]

Thanks for the answers I can burn about 40 episodes in AVI format in a single DVD, while I can only burn 4 or 5 in a single DVD if I use a program like PowerProducer to make a *real* DVD, with menues and all the jingles...

Using AVI certainly spares me from long copying and producing sessions

[Matri]

Yeah, but it gets to be a hassle to start off from the middle of that list on your player

[Azrael Strife]

Yeah, but it gets to be a hassle to start off from the middle of that list on your player

What do you mean? the player lists the AVI files and I get to choose whichever I want...

[Bomb Bloke]

That might be dependant on the player.

 

I've become very happy with my X-Box when it comes to media playback. Due to the efforts of hackers, I can plug in a network cable and stream just about anything to it from my PC (or I could transfer stuff directly to the console and play it from there, if I hadn't filled up it's 320gb HDD...).