Dvd Decay?

[Dvd Aficionado]

I'm a dvd collector - hence my user name

Dvd decay or rot has become a serious problem for collectors, and we can't do anything to stop it.

I have experienced two cases of dvd rot: THE YAKUZA and THE HAND, both R1 US Warner Bros dvds bought new and sealed, handled with care, without any scratches. I always hold my dvds as instructed, put them back into the cases after watching and even keep them in resealable plastics.

The first time I watched them, the discs played perfectly. A year and a half later both skipped to the point of becoming unplayable (picture freezes, pixellates and disc stops playing).

There is another WB dvd that has shown signs of rot (read: skipping) - PAPILLON. Though I haven't retested it lately. It's very likely to become another victim of dvd rot.

I'm thinking that dvd decay or rot must be caused by sub-par authoring process which sacrificed quality for quantity. There is no other reasonable explanation for this.

If this happens to dvds, this may happen to blu-ray too

[WilsonBros]

J*sus - the curse of laser-rot from the days of the big ol' shiny discs has returned. There was a lot of panic about the durabiliy of Laser-Discs and how they would become vulnerable to laser-rot. Some called the whole thing a conspiracy theory that manufacturers wanted collectors to keep buying them., whilst others denied the existence of the very concept.

In the end, most agreed that some Laser-Discs ended up becoming unbonded through the materials either wearing out or being made of inferior materials, regardless of there being no real proof. Some believe storage conditions exploit an inherent weakness in the discs, so maybe this is the case here.

For the record, we bought the US disc of Tomorrow Never Dies with out first player back in August 1998, and the DVD is still playing just as well as it ever did.

[AnamorphicWidescreen]

Good information here. Thankfully, it sounds like this type of thing is rare re: DVD's.

Hopefully it won't happen with Blu's....IMHO Blu's are better made, anyway, since they're more scratch-resistant, but that doesn't necessarily mean that they won't have this issue...

[Member-167298]

Originally Posted by Dvd Aficionado

I'm a dvd collector - hence my user name

Dvd decay or rot has become a serious problem for collectors, and we can't do anything to stop it.

I have experienced two cases of dvd rot: THE YAKUZA and THE HAND, both R1 US Warner Bros dvds bought new and sealed, handled with care, without any scratches. I always hold my dvds as instructed, put them back into the cases after watching and even keep them in resealable plastics.

The first time I watched them, the discs played perfectly. A year and a half later both skipped to the point of becoming unplayable (picture freezes, pixellates and disc stops playing).

I bought a brand new copy of The Hand last year and experienced the same problem. I am going to guess it might be a manufacturing error of some kind.

[8traxrule]

Another common rotter was the first issue of "Vertigo", with the orange cover (not the later one with the Alfred Hitchcock profile.) A friend gave me one just to see if I could get it to play, but no go.

I've had Boogie Nights and Halloween 4 become completely unplayable a few years after buying them new, also Training Day went bad a couple years later. Of course a TON of HD-DVDs from Warner's manufacturer have gone bad, either not loading at all or freezing in the middle (I've had long threads about that on a few forums.)

[AmishParadise]

I own over 2,200 DVD's which I started purchased day one of the format. Not a single case of DVD rot here either. Moved a couple years ago in fact and took the opportunity when unloading them from my Sony DVD changers prior to the move to inspect them, each and every one looking as pristine as the day they were removed from their original packaging and placed in the given changer. And yes, a significant number of them are played each year, no issues to date, the primary TV watching in my home being DVD's and Blu-ray's. No streaming takes place in my home and broadcast TV gets little to no play aside from sports programming.

[bhampton]

Day 1? Really?... I remember seeing a circuit city ad that claimed there were over 13 available titles on DVD... I don't remember which ones were first. Do you remember what you bought day 1?

I agree with you about broadcast and mostly agree with you about streaming. I used to watch broadcast sports (NFL) but FreeQAM went away and I get nothing over the air here. (I've never paid for broadcast or cable.)

I would say i'm fully against streaming to but honestly we have amazon prime and if a movie is free in HD on there and otherwise hard to come by I tend to watch it that way if for no other reason I like to see if it's worth buying when it's available on Blu.

[DrrnHarr]

Originally Posted by bhampton

Day 1? Really?... I remember seeing a circuit city ad that claimed there were over 13 available titles on DVD... I don't remember which ones were first. Do you remember what you bought day 1?

The only DVDs that were available Day 1 were three or four IMAX specials.

DVD was launched in the US in March 1997, I made the jump in May 1998.

[JeffTheMovieGuy]

A lot of my dvds had a problem with rot or mold, I think it had something to do with the environment and the fact that before we got new windows the walls would sweat. Thankfully blurays have a protective coating. Even though not every movie looks great on blu, I see bluray as an investment in saving film.

[AnamorphicWidescreen]

Originally Posted by JeffTheMovieGuy

A lot of my dvds had a problem with rot or mold, I think it had something to do with the environment and the fact that before we got new windows the walls would sweat. Thankfully blurays have a protective coating. Even though not every movie looks great on blu, I see bluray as an investment in saving film.

Yes - prior to joining this site earlier this year, I was unaware that Blu's had the protective coating on them since it's tough to actually see. However, the fact is that Blu's are much less prone to scratches than DVD's - so, even if the PQ between a Blu & DVD is negligible, it's still worth it to invest a little extra $ (if you're buying a film, since TV seasons on Blu are a lot more than DVD's) to get the Blu over the DVD.

I question why this protective coating wasn't ever put on DVD's and/or CD's over the years...CD's have been around since 1982 (32 years), and are still being produced to some extent. Regular DVD's are also still being produced. I guess the protective coating is expensive, hence their only putting this on Blu's - which typically sell for a higher price point than regular DVD's. That being said, ironically I have seen some music CD's that sell for a lot more than Blu's...in the same store.

[GrouchoFan]

Originally Posted by 8traxrule

Another common rotter was the first issue of "Vertigo", with the orange cover (not the later one with the Alfred Hitchcock profile.) A friend gave me one just to see if I could get it to play, but no go.

Yep, my original copy of Vertigo died a few years ago. No visible signs of damage. It just doesn't play. I couldn't go without Vertigo in my collection, so eventually I got the replacement with the other cover mentioned above, and put the DVD in the old case. I just picked up the single Blu-ray release last week; I'm debating whether to put that into the DVD case, that original cover with the theatrical poster art is soooo much better than the Blu cover it's not funny.

As far as I know, out of close to 1,000, that's the only of my DVDs to go bad (knock on wood!).