Monsters Inc DVD (technical issues merged thread) (1 Viewer)

[David Stone]

Can someone point me to the phone number of Buena Vista Home Video? I would like to call them and ask how they plan to correct my defective disc.

 

[Gordon Moore]

Dear Lord,
This should go down as one of the world's worst layer change. Very poorly placed . Disney really dropped the ball on this. Very dissapointing because it's a fantastic movie with awesome features.

 

[Jeff Kleist]

Same here. I guess this confirms an issue with the 414. First disc that's ever given me a problem

 

[Keith Paynter]

Pioneer DV-525. Freeze-up at layer change (Ch30/31).
Sucks!
Bad Di$ney!!

 

[Blaine]

As a point of clarification, there should not be a layer change on this title. The widescreen version is on one layer with the Full frame version on the other. Any freezing or pauses are unacceptable.

BTW, my DVL-919 froze during Chapter 30 on the widescreen playback.

Blane

 

[Blaine]

Upon further investigation, I agree, this delay is a layer change. Typically they (the DVD authors) don't do RSDL on a Widescreen/Full Screen disc - they do widescreen on one layer and Full Screen on the other.

For Monsters, Inc. it appears they did the title RSDL and the layer change is at 84:01 in the widescreen version.

That being said, the Malata plays through it with just the typical Layer Change pause as does my Panasonic DVD-A110.

My Pioneer DVL-919 freezes and you must scan through the trouble spot. My Pioneer DVD-Rom drive doesn't freeze but it does jump around a bit.

Blaine

 

[Evelio Figueroa]

My Pioneer DV-47A had no problems with the layer change. It did seem like it was going to freeze, but it keep on going. The pause was a tiny bit longer than normal. And this is the 1st time I came across a layer change near the end of the movie.

This has been answered in other threads. The THX intro on Toy Story 2 was remixed for EX and the extra bass was added.

yup, it be true.
Also listen to the "moos." It doesn't sound the same. The THX trailer on the Monsters Inc is the original theatrical version.

 

[Blaine]

Now I don't want to get too far off topic here, but am I alone in thinking that we never had this kind of mastering error rate in LaserDisc. Sure, there were a handful of releases that were recalled for various reasons, but it seems that mastering errors are rampent with DVD.

Blaine

 

[nousername]

As a point of clarification, there should not be a layer change on this title. The widescreen version is on one layer with the Full frame version on the other. Any freezing or pauses are unacceptable.

Why can't the widescreen version be on both layers, while the fullscreen only on one?

Anyway, I have the Canadian version, which only has the widescreen version. I, too, noticed the layer change. It paused for half a second and then resumed normally on my Panasonic DVD-RP82. Did the exact same thing on my Panasonic DVD-RV31. No big deal. I'm used to layers changes by now. Sure beats flipping/switching discs!

I don't expect great layer-change performance at this price point. The RP82 and RV31 are pretty inexpensive compared to other models. Perhaps one day all DVD players will have seamless layer-change capability.

I'm sorry to hear that this title completely froze some people's players, however. I do wish Disney would make their DVDs more widely compatible...

 

[William Waits]

Isn't "THX Certified" supposed to mean something?

With all of the bad disc problems from Disney, especially the technical ones like the Tarzan DVD, and crappy video such as The Sound Of Music and some other non-Disney titles, for me, the "THX Certified" has become more of a Warning sign than a sign of quality...

Anyone else feel like this....? I think that the folks at THX and the QA departments of the offending studios REALLY need to re-asses the "quality" of their certified products. It is becoming a joke...

Bill

 

[Christian Preischl]

Bill,

generally THX means nothing to me except an added trailer you have to skip through to finally get to the film.

However, the combo Disney/THX certainly sets off all warning signs. As I've said before, it's almost traditional for a thread like this to pop up whenever a new Disney 2-discer is released.

I shudder to think what problems the Beauty and the Beast DVD will have, considering they'll use seemless branching on that one!

Chris

 

[Terrell]

Can someone tell me how Monsters Inc. is not a quality DVD? If anything, THX did their job on this one. Although, since Lucas sold off THX to another company, I'm not sure how much he cares about it anymore. The question is does the company he sold it to care about it.

But Monsters Inc. is clearly one of the best DVDs I've ever seen. As for the glitches, this seems to mainly be a problem with Disney DVDs. So this may not be the responsibility of THX, if their other DVDs don't have these same problems.

 

[Ken Bentley]

NP on with mine both discs played fine. that includes sound,picture qual and no freezing at any chapters.

i got mine at k-mart. if that helps. i have noticed people who been having probs got theres from bestbuy..

 

[JamieD]

If it's not a layer change, I'll be muchly suprised. Behaved EXACTLY like one, and is at a place where they could put one without completely disrupting the flow of the movie. Unfortunate that it's causing problems though.

 

[Shane_M]

I read this forum yesterday before picking up M-Inc. and I noticed a longer pause than usual on track 30. I thought it was frozen because it to so long.

 

[DaveM]

As David Lambert posted above, computer DVD players should not see the layer change...but my system sure did notice something at this point. The audio popped and then briefly dropped out. I have never had a problem like this with any of my other discs on my HTPC. While I noticed a difference in the THX intro from the Toy Story 2 intro, I think the movie itself sounded great on my small system. I did not see this in movies though so I am not sure how it sounded there. Overall I am pleased with this disc even with the sound problem and problem with Zoomplayer.

 

[Yannick Martin]

No problem on my Pioneer 333 with the Canadian version but the layer change is a little longuer than usual.

Haven't test it on my old Toshiba 3006 in the bedroom (it's on that player that I have most problems) or on my parent's Pioneer 343.

YM

 

[Andrew Chong]

I watched it yesterday with my dvd-rom with hardware mpeg decoder and still noticed the split-second pause as the layer changed. It didn't detract from my enjoyment of the movie.

Too bad the feature disc doesn't take advantage of all that empty space: only about 5 gigabytes compared to about 7 on the supplemental disc.

 

[Ray Chuang]

Methinks the way the Buena Vista Home Entertainment DVD's are encoded are causing no end of problems with certain DVD decoding chipsets.
On my computer at home (it uses a Pioneer SD-M1202 drive, the DVD playback program is PowerDVD XP 4.0 patched with the latest upgrade from Cyberlink, the graphics card is an ATI Radeon SDR 32 MB AGP, all under Windows 98) the layer change at 84:01 on the widescreen version worked seamlessly with no problems.
I would suggest the following:
1. Check with the DVD console box manufacturer. You might be able to get a firmware upgrade to fix the layer-change problem.
2. If you're running a DVD-ROM drive, make sure you are running the current version of WinDVD, PowerDVD, etc. with all appropriate patches installed from the program manufacturer.
3. Definitely contact Buena Vista Home Entertainment on their web site or toll-free number listed on the box. I had an experience with loss of screen sharpness in certain scenes with Disc 1 from the Collector's Edition of Atlantis: The Lost Empire and BVHE sent me a properly working replacement disc within two weeks.

 

[Bob Friend]

Happens in the same spot on my JVC XVF85. Looks like it's not limited to just Pioneer players.