Is the protective coating any good ?

[Carlsberg19]

My big question about blu-ray is this...IS THE PROTECTIVE COATING ANY GOOD?

the reason i ask is, before blu-ray came about i rented and copied about 400 dvd's that i collected over the years and stored them in a lockable number located dvd case, 4 years later, any of them dvd's i play are gauranteed to stick and generally cause me enough frustration to snap the disc in 2 even though the discs are in immaculate condition and played perfectly when i first copied them? why is this happening? and more so i hope blu-ray doesnt go down the same road in the coming years.

[Beta Man]

I took a key to Spiderman 3 (terrible movie in my opinion) and it still played flawlessly....

The coating is really good.... and I've never had a movie from Netflix skip yet.... and I've rented a lot of DVDs from them, and one out of 6 or so usually skips or becomes pixel-ated (thank you Don King) at one point or another, so I'd say it's safe to say the coating is doing its job.

[CptGreedle]

It is at least as good as the extra protective layer on DVD. It is not as thick but it tends to be tougher stuff. It is more resistant to finger prints and scratches, and many (including myself) claim that it is better than what DVD offers. Although the technology differs manufacturer to manufacturer, they all pretty much work the same and have the same effectiveness.
Some have complained about scratched Blu-rays in rental stores, but it seems to be a limited problem and mostly due to over-renting of a limited number of titles. DVDs have a short life-span in rental companies but tons of copies, while Blu-ray had limited numbers so it could not be directly compared since more people were renting the same disc.

[jkwest]

The coating was reason #3 in buying movies on Blu-ray....I have kids...kids are not disc friendly, even if you teach them well...But, I am stress less when they take off with a blu-ray to watch upstairs on the PS3...

[Thegide]

Originally Posted by Carlsberg19

My big question about blu-ray is this...IS THE PROTECTIVE COATING ANY GOOD?

the reason i ask is, before blu-ray came about i rented and copied about 400 dvd's that i collected over the years and stored them in a lockable number located dvd case, 4 years later, any of them dvd's i play are gauranteed to stick and generally cause me enough frustration to snap the disc in 2 even though the discs are in immaculate condition and played perfectly when i first copied them? why is this happening? and more so i hope blu-ray doesnt go down the same road in the coming years.

I would suggest the flaw isn't necessarily with DVD technology but perhaps the quality of your burns? While I'm not here to discuss the ethics and legal issues of your collection, I do suggest that had you purchased the DVDs rather than copying them, I would expect they would still play fine today, because of higher quality recording technology used to produce retail DVDs (compared to your average home DVD burner - As an example, I used to burn audio CDs from MP3. On my older burner, max speed burns (48x) would give me a disc that skipped or didn't play in a number of CD players. I had to burn them at 16x to generate a better quality burn that didn't have these issues)

My limited understanding of the chemistry behind the data layer of a DVD is that over time, the pits that encode the binary data erode due to natural decay. There are differences between mass-produced DVDs and your typical writeable DVD which, if I were to guess, would mean that the decay of a mass-printed DVD is much slower and/or the depth and definition of the pits is better defined.

Anyways, I don't think the problem with your DVDs is the lack of a protective coating, especially since you've said your discs are in immaculate condition. The Blu-ray coating is excellent as it is incredibly scratch resistant (and surprisingly thick as well). I would expect that the lifespan of a Blu-ray disc well exceeds that of a standard mass-printed DVD for this reason alone.

[Carlsberg19]

Originally Posted by Thegide

I would suggest the flaw isn't necessarily with DVD technology but perhaps the quality of your burns? While I'm not here to discuss the ethics and legal issues of your collection, I do suggest that had you purchased the DVDs rather than copying them, I would expect they would still play fine today, because of higher quality recording technology used to produce retail DVDs (compared to your average home DVD burner - As an example, I used to burn audio CDs from MP3. On my older burner, max speed burns (48x) would give me a disc that skipped or didn't play in a number of CD players. I had to burn them at 16x to generate a better quality burn that didn't have these issues)

My limited understanding of the chemistry behind the data layer of a DVD is that over time, the pits that encode the binary data erode due to natural decay. There are differences between mass-produced DVDs and your typical writeable DVD which, if I were to guess, would mean that the decay of a mass-printed DVD is much slower and/or the depth and definition of the pits is better defined.

Anyways, I don't think the problem with your DVDs is the lack of a protective coating, especially since you've said your discs are in immaculate condition. The Blu-ray coating is excellent as it is incredibly scratch resistant (and surprisingly thick as well). I would expect that the lifespan of a Blu-ray disc well exceeds that of a standard mass-printed DVD for this reason alone.

Yea your probably right, it was the only thing i could think off, so that means i have about 400+ "copied" dvd's and im guessing only 250 will play correctly, well we will see in time, 4 years later lets see how blu-ray holds up, thanks.

[MOONPHASE]

the coating is 1 reason why i chose Blu-ray over Hd-Dvd because of how good the protection is

[DIY_HD]

Commercially produced DVDs use a much more powerful laser to actually cut/burn a pit into the media. A home burner uses a low-power laser and a disc with a layer that darkens from the heat generated by the laser which creates a visual pit, not a physical one. Over time, these "pits" grow in size and evenually bleed together due to ambient heat. I don't know if you can store these in your refrigerator or freezer to extend their lifespan. Your basement or a cool dry place would be reasonable.

I haven't read any scratch tests conducted on Blu-Discs. Anyone run across one?

[neo_reloaded]

Burned media is much more susceptible to temperature and UV damage due to the dye they contain, and have a much shorter lifespan even when stored in optimal conditions. Pressed (store-bought replicated DVD-ROMs) media is much more resilient.

[mjbethancourt]

I did get one blu-ray disc where the coating came free and partially peeled off before I even got a chance to view it; but that's got to be a freak occurrence, a defective manufacture. Amazon replaced it without even waiting for me to send the bad one back.

[Branden]

Originally Posted by Carlsberg19

My big question about blu-ray is this...IS THE PROTECTIVE COATING ANY GOOD?

the reason i ask is, before blu-ray came about i rented and copied about 400 dvd's that i collected over the years and stored them in a lockable number located dvd case, 4 years later, any of them dvd's i play are gauranteed to stick and generally cause me enough frustration to snap the disc in 2 even though the discs are in immaculate condition and played perfectly when i first copied them? why is this happening? and more so i hope blu-ray doesnt go down the same road in the coming years.

all recordable discs (CD-R/RW, DVD-R/RW/+R/RW, and i presume BD-R/RW as well) degrade rather quickly compared to stamped retail discs, it's something to do with the different chemicals used.
my wife backed up all her university files onto CD-R, 3 years later they're all coasters. they improved the lifetime with DVD-R a bit and i assume even more with BD-R. like you i also have 200+ copied DVD-R movies, some are 7 years old and i believe they all still work. if you use quality discs (ie. ritek) and burn at lower speeds (4x) with a quality burner (ie. not LG) your data will last longer.

[Bobby Henderson]

The protective coating is good, but that feature should not be interpreted as making a BD damage proof. The 50GB of data capacity on Blu-ray makes for some very microscopic data spots on the 5" disc. That also makes the discs far less tolerant of finger prints, smudges, scratches and other garbage that should never wind up on the playing surface.

Countless numbers of people have very bad disc handling habits with music CDs and DVDs. The protective layer on Blu-ray discs should not make those people believe they can mishandle these new discs like they would any others.

Blu-ray discs will get ruined sooner or later if the bare discs are left out on tables, carpets or other surfaces outside of the case. They'll eventually get scratched up enough to be ruined if users just rub them on whatever shirt or jeans they're wearing to clean oily finger prints or other smudges off the disc surface (I've personally seen lots of people do this with CDs and DVDs). It's a very bad idea to take bare Blu-ray discs and store them in those clear, plastic sleeve booklets. DVDs and CDs are often ruined by those stupid things.

[WickyWoo]

the reason i ask is, before blu-ray came about i rented and copied about 400 dvd's that i collected over the years and stored them in a lockable number located dvd case, 4 years later, any of them dvd's i play are gauranteed to stick and generally cause me enough frustration to snap the disc in 2 even though the discs are in immaculate condition and played perfectly when i first copied them? why is this happening? and more so i hope blu-ray doesnt go down the same road in the coming years.

Because you used cheap discs. Even under optimal conditions you should re-burn anything you value every other year

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