Early Blu-rays that may have playback issues (Criterion, Well Go USA, etc.)

[jscoggins]

Originally Posted by BohemianGraham

Any reason about this? My disc just started doing this tonight, and there's some slight bronzing on it. I've watched the disc a total of 4x, counting tonight, since I bought it in 2011, and this is the first time it's done this. I'm going to test it in my HTPC, because it skipped in my Panasonic DMP BD-65 player. Frustrated, because I've used that player in the past with no issues.

Yup, you won the lottery. Your disc is suffering from disc rot.

[bokes]

Anyone receive replacements yet for discs sent in?
I sent in Paris Texas a week and half ago and still nothing.
I am right in NYC- so not sure why it's taking so long.

[BohemianGraham]

Originally Posted by jscoggins

Yup, you won the lottery. Your disc is suffering from disc rot.

I was asking the original poster about why he claimed around the 1:52 mark the freezing was unrelated to the disc rot, as I can jump forward about 10 minutes and play the rest of the feature

[jscoggins]

Originally Posted by BohemianGraham

I was asking the original poster about why he claimed around the 1:52 mark the freezing was unrelated to the disc rot, as I can jump forward about 10 minutes and play the rest of the feature

Should be the same problem.

[jayembee]

Originally Posted by MechaGodzilla

Ugh, yeah. Please don't let Blu-ray become the new LaserDisc...

Except that the LD rot issue was blown entirely out of proportion. Including both LDs that I still have and ones that I sold off or traded in, I would guestimate that I've had at least 2000 LDs pass through my hands, and I experienced laser rot on fewer than a dozen titles. The problem was that it had gotten to the point where any flaw at all was perceived to be a symptom of rot.

So, yeah, "Please don't let Blu-ray become the new LaserDisc" is right. There are times here where I get the sense that when a disc has an issue playing, people leap to the conclusion that it's rot that's the problem. Which just fosters the problem that the rot issue is worse than it really is, and makes people panic that their entire collection is going to be unplayable.

[MechaGodzilla]

Originally Posted by jayembee

Except that the LD rot issue was blown entirely out of proportion. Including both LDs that I still have and ones that I sold off or traded in, I would guestimate that I've had at least 2000 LDs pass through my hands, and I experienced laser rot on fewer than a dozen titles. The problem was that it had gotten to the point where any flaw at all was perceived to be a symptom of rot.

So, yeah, "Please don't let Blu-ray become the new LaserDisc" is right. There are times here where I get the sense that when a disc has an issue playing, people leap to the conclusion that it's rot that's the problem. Which just fosters the problem that the rot issue is worse than it really is, and makes people panic that their entire collection is going to be unplayable.

Fair enough. I never really got into LaserDisc (it was before my time), I was mostly just judging based on what I've seen several former LD collectors say about the format, which I'm aware isn't always the best thing to do.

[Five Inches]

I just watched The Big Lebowski this weekend and no playback issue. I check each blu-ray that I play now, and it showed no sign of bronzing, luckily.

[BasiliskFang]

Originally Posted by hariseldon

Go with the above answer.

Personally I've played or scanned several thousand LD's and the rot rate was easily under 1%. If you discount discs from 2 pressing factories, it was likely a 1% of even that rate particularly after 1992.

Unfortunately there were 2 or 3 high profile, high volume releases that were most affected -- part of the first pressing of Star Wars Definitive Edition, the major Alien SE boxsets, Beauty and Beast WIP are the one's I especially remember.

Wip?

[wormraper]

Originally Posted by PietSchwan

Looking further, some of my Anchor Bay blurays from 2010 to 2012 have an IFPI mold SID code of 2F**, and an IFPI mastering SID code of "LY 02".


The few Anchor Bay blurays I own which were released before 2010, have an IFPI mastering SID code in the range L321 to L325, while the IFPI mold SID code is OW**.

Also the one 2013 Anchor Bay title I own (the final season of Spartacus), also has an IFPI mastering SID code in the range L321 to L325, while the IFPI mold SID code is OW**.


If "CMCA / Deluxe" (with IFPI mold SID code 2F**) was manufacturing shoddy substandard quality blurays for Anchor Bay over 2010 to 2012 (or 2013), then this might explain why there were tons of complaints about the season 1 bluray set of "Spartacus: Blood and Sand" having too many technical playback problems. ("Spartacus: Blood and Sand" was released on September 21, 2010).

lol, out of paranoia I went and double checked my spartacus blood and sand, and gods of the Arena discs... all good there

[jayembee]

Originally Posted by hariseldon

Unfortunately there were 2 or 3 high profile, high volume releases that were most affected -- part of the first pressing of Star Wars Definitive Edition, the major Alien SE boxsets, Beauty and Beast WIP are the one's I especially remember.

Originally Posted by BasiliskFang

Wip?

WIP = Work In Progress

Because Beauty and the Beast was still playing theatrically in other parts of the world when it came time to release it in the US on home video, Disney was reluctant to release it on the (at the time) high-quality laserdisc format due to concerns that people in other countries would import the LD instead of going to see it in the theater. Or concerns that pirates would sell bootleg tapes copied from the LD.

Their solution was to not release that final film on LD at that time (they did eventually release it almost a year later) but instead they released a "Work in Progress" version that was the complete film, albeit in a form that was a combination of storyboards, rough b&w animation, and some finished animation.

I imagine this might not sound all that appealing, but it actually was popular with LD consumers. In addition to LD buyers getting something unique (the WIP version wasn't released in any other format), it was a fascinating look at the process of creating an animated film.

[BasiliskFang]

What program is good for scanning?

[jayembee]

Originally Posted by BasiliskFang

What program is good for scanning?

I use VSO Inspector. It's freeware. Just use your search engine of choice to find a site to grab it from.

[Brian81]

Originally Posted by hariseldon

Go with the above answer.

Personally I've played or scanned several thousand LD's and the rot rate was easily under 1%. If you discount discs from 2 pressing factories, it was likely a 1% of even that rate particularly after 1992.

Unfortunately there were 2 or 3 high profile, high volume releases that were most affected -- part of the first pressing of Star Wars Definitive Edition, the major Alien SE boxsets, Beauty and Beast WIP are the one's I especially remember.

Sony DADC discs with matrix numbers 3000 and up...


FWIW, my defect rate was higher. Probably around 7% I would say. Replacement copies solved the issue most of the time, with a couple exceptions where I gave up after a second replacement try. Always had luck with the Japanese discs, except for one Toshiba disc from 1982.

Though some of that 7% wasn't colored snow. It was WHITE snow, that when paused, would show as random colors. I even had discs where you'd have a colored dot that would just slowly slide across the screen from left to right, complete with trail. The lone bad JPN disc, had video that was near complete static, like you were watching an analog broadcast TV station without an antenna. But then the sound was good. Unfortunately it was a RARE one that I was never able to replace.

[neo_reloaded]

Why are we suddenly on a search for 2F** discs from Deluxe? Because one guy had a bad BD of The Eye and there were some issues with one season of Spartacus? Neither were bronzing incidents, so doing a search for that facility's mold SID in the manner we are doing for the Sonopress facility seems like an extreme overreaction...

[wormraper]

Originally Posted by PietSchwan

Found some more Fox/MGM titles with IFPI mastering code SID of LY02, and IFPI mold SID code of 2F**. They're mostly earlier bluray releases from 2006 to 2009.

2006
- The League Extraordinary Gentlemen

2007
- The Sentinel
- The Day After Tomorrow
- Chain Reaction

2008
- Wall Street
- Firefly (complete series)

2009
- Taken 1
- X2: X-Men United
- Quantum of Solace
- Rocky franchise (except 1 and 2 which were IFPI mold SID code OW**)


Probably the owners of "CMCA / Deluxe" (IFPI mold SID code 2F**) were pissed when Fox stopped using their services.

and this is important why? none of the ones besids the LB42 and the L606 from well go have been bad.

[neo_reloaded]

Originally Posted by PietSchwan

I suppose it could be an overreaction.

I'll leave it at that.

(This will be my last post on this).

I'm not trying to silence you if there was a real issue. I'm just saying that the information provided so far is not indicative of any such issue, and we should not be treating it the way we are treating a known issue like the Criterion/Sonopress problem.

If you come across something that is major, I'm sure we'd rather hear it than have it bite us later. But please just consider the context of what you are posting.

[I KEEL YOU]

Originally Posted by PietSchwan

In a hypothetical "perfect storm" nightmare scenario.

We'll all be screwed if IFPI LV78, LV79 and LV80 (Universal, Paramount, and Warner) and IFPI L321, L322, L323, L324, and L325 (Sony, Disney/Buena Vista, Fox, Lionsgate, and Warner), all start to go bad in the future.

Originally Posted by wormraper

lol, that would quite literally kill the format

Wow! Are all those potential casualties to bronzing? It wouldn't only kill the current blu ray format. There's a year to year and a half until the new 4K blu ray format is released. If those collectively start to bronze by then, it would NOT be a good start for 4K blu. In fact, this Bronzegate would be to physical media in general what that meteorite that struck earth 65 mil. years ago was to dinosaurs.

[jscoggins]

No, for some reason, people are posting IFPI codes for everything, which is pointless. We need information about bad discs, not ones that are perfectly fine.

[atlantajoseph]

Originally Posted by kuro_sawa

anyone here sent in a L'Ecclisse dual format DVD and received a replacement? Ok to send to them?

Yes, received the replacement DVD with correct commentary, no issues at all... that was before the current, totally unrelated situation with bronzed BDs became well-known though, so who knows what their customer service backlog is now. I'd recommend sending an e-mail first to be safe.

[tilallr1]

This thread now has me paranoid of the issue and concerned it might be more widespread. I have close to 1000 discs to check, but I will do it dammit. I want to know now how many of my discs are affected.

I have had playback issues with early releases, but usually switching to an older blu-ray player with outdated firmware fixes the issue. I think a lot of newer firmware updates actually break playback for some older discs. A recent example of a disc that froze on my PS3 is Ferris Bueller. Worked fine on my old cheap blu-ray Walmart region free player.