Players with Smooth Layer Changes? (1 Viewer)

[Greg Mariotti]

Do any have RAM built in that provide a seamless layer change?

Thanks

 

[Charles J P]

I've heard that the Denons above the 1600 have a memory buffer. "3MB Memory Buffer to decrease layer change pauses or pickup dropouts"

 

[DanielSmi]

The Denon 9000 has 64MB to help with the layer change. Both the 9000 and 3800 can do a later change in .5 seconds while the 1600 does it in 1.75 seconds.

Daniel Smith

 

[Bill Will]

My Proscan is still great at layer changes

 

[Phil Nichols]

I've had a Denon 3800 for about 7 months and have never seen a layer change. Movies play all the way through from beginning to end smoothly - just like my 'good old' VCR does! Shootout 3 says about .5 seconds for the Denon 3800 and 9000, but I think that's a conservative "guess" or "estimate" by the Secrets guys. I see no visual interruption on the 3800 and I would see one-half second if it was there.

 

[Kevin. W]

I think we wouldn't have to worry about layer changes if those making the DVD's would just put the layer change in a spot thats not noticeable.

Kevin

 

[Han]

It's too late now, Kevin. What are they going to do, go back and remaster those thousands of old DVDs and reissue them for those of us who complained? It's really in the hands of the hardware manufacturers at this point.

Plus, (I'm repeating myself from another thread) I never bought the idea that there's this "small window" in which to put a layer change in for each movie. I've seen it happen less than 10 minutes into a movie, I've seen it between two versions of a movie (WS & FF), and I've seen it towards the end of a 2.5 hour movie. I've also seen it placed sometimes (but not often enough) at a fade out scene where there isn't any music or sounds.

 

[ManW_TheUncool]

but I think that's a conservative "guess" or "estimate" by the Secrets guys

They use a worst case scenario (ie. very conservative) for the test:

http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/volum...Layer%20Change

I've used 3 different Toshiba players over the years w/ hundreds of DVDs, but rarely ever see a layer change that exceeded ~.5 sec. I also rarely hear of players that do worse on typical DVDs.

_Man_

 

[John Kotches]

Yes, but in any case, what it isn't is an "estimate" or "guess". It's measured with a stop watch.

The credits roll pauses at the beginning of the layer change (click the stopwatch) and resumes at the end of the layer change. This layer change is at maximum bit rate, without RSDL, so a full stroke seek to track 0 and a refocus are required.

There are a number of DVDs that are authored in this fashion, ie no RSDL. So it's a real world test case.

If you want to see a player with a slow layer change, try the Kenwood DV-5700. If you want to see a really fast layer change, the Denons mentioned earlier do nicely, as do Meridian players.

Regards,

 

[ManW_TheUncool]

There are a number of DVDs that are authored in this fashion, ie no RSDL. So it's a real world test case.

Is there a list for such DVDs readily available on the web? I guess I'd only care if the layer change happens during the movie. I didn't realize there were realworld DVDs that were authored that way.

_Man_

 

[John Kotches]

Man-Fai,

I doubt it. DVD-Profiler only tells you whether the disc is Dual Layer or not, it doesn't indicate RSDL vs just Dual Layer. The earlier the title, the less likely it is to have RSDL for layer changes. Since RSDL is part of the spec but not mandatory, the WHQL test annex disc is fully within specifications for DVD Authoring.

Since I do some testing in my regular job, I have to say that using worst case scenarios is one of the better approaches. You want to see how bad things can be -- and the WHQL disc expores that very well.

It's been several months since I've used the Kenwood as a DVD-V player, so I don't recall which ones were really bad. As it is now it is part of my 2nd system, which I'm only using for DVD-A/SACD playback.

Even on a slower layer change, a well timed change is essentially unnoticable. Signs for example, had a very good layer change.

I've been using the Meridian for about 4 months now, and it can be tough picking up the layer change.

Regards,

 

[Anthony F.]

The trade-off with the Sharp dvd players is that if there is dialogue during the layer change it'll appear in subtitles. Otherwise the layer change is perfectly seamless.

 

[David Susilo]

consider this:

As an experiment, I copy a dual-layered disc to my HDD, when I played it back, the spot where the layer change is located, still pauses for a split second before continuing.

Another experiment: That very same image is recompressed to fit a single layer, STILL, the layer-change spot pauses for a brief moment.

I tried both methods with more than 70 movies so far. The only one that doesn't pause is the original release of T2. The funny thing is, even the original T2 has less pause time played using regular DVD players (Pioneer DV-05, Pana DVD-A300, Rp-56, RV-22, DMR-E30, Yamaha 530, 760, 1000).

So my conclusion is that the pause is also caused by the mastering, not the player alone. If it is NOT because of the mastering, then movies played directly from the HDD or movies recompressed from 2 layers into 1 layer should NOT have that pause at all.

 

[John Kotches]

T2 has a defined seamless layer change in the authoring, as do Sony's Superbit titles.

A friend of mine in the know says that this is in violation of the DVD specs, but I've yet to see a player "barf" on these titles.

Regards,

 

[Han]

And I've yet to read or hear about the "DVD spec police" coming after and pulling over Columbia/Tristar for putting seamless layer changes in their Superbit titles. Maybe other studios shouldn't be so scared to do the same.

 

[Adam Barratt]

I was able to detect the layer change on the original T2 on many different players (every player I tried it on, in fact). It was well placed: during a static shot of a knife in a table top, but the change was still easily detectable if you were looking for it (on one Pioneer player the change even took around ~6 seconds).

Layer changes are more a function of the disc than the player. As John points out, most Superbits are authored with seamless layer changes, but most discs force a buffer dump at the layer change. The speed of the transport would then appear to be more of a factor in layer change times than buffer memory.

Adam