Can DVDs Kill DVD Players?

aidanpryde asks: "In the weirdest situation I've ever seen. My DVD player died on Saturday while watching the episodes of a favorite sci-fi series. I was watching disk 5 with my wife and noticed that it was getting jumpy. I took the disk out to see if it was dirty or scratched, but seeing nothing, we put the disk back in. Now the DVD player won't read anything, not the Season 5 disk, none of our other disks...nothing! So, we take the DVD player as a loss. Hardware failure happen all of the time, right? So I go downstairs with my wife on another day and try it on her DVD player in her computer. We get through one episode of the disk and it starts to jump again. We take it out, try another disk and sure enough -- nothing works. Has anyone ever run into DVD's that kill DVD players? Is there any way that I can get compensation for my dead DVD players? Is there any ideas as to why this has happened. Can I download firmware updates for the computer drive that may fix the problem?"

Comments

firmware updates

[XO]

There are also often firmware updates for non-computer based DVD players as well.

I know that CyberHome and Panasonic have released firmware updates for some of their players over the past, and I'd bet others have too..

it works like:
burn a CD with the firmware file using a computer
put the CD into the DVD player
press "Play".

Hope you didn't fry it. :D

Yep!

[Anonymous Coward]

I have a copy of Shaolin Soccer that killed a
Hitachi dvd player. I tried this copy on my Cyberhome
player but it refuses to play (suggesting something
wrong with disk). I got another copy of the movie
and that copy works okay. Apparently the crap
Hitachi player had something happen and now it won't
read any disks.

Shintaro Blank DVDs

[thegrassyknowl]

I have seen a warning on the back of Shintaro blank DVDs that says not to use it with Pioneer (some specific models that I can't remember) drives.

Apparantly unless you put in some after-market firmware the drive will be irrepairably damaged by burning onto these Shintaro blanks.

Wierd!!!

Re:Shintaro Blank DVDs

[Oliver Wendell Jones]

Pioneer DVD burners that max out at less than 4x had problems with 4x media and could spin up too fast and damage the media or the drive.

A simple firmware fix from Pioneer corrected this problem.

Re:Disc balance ?

[MBCook]

Something mechanical like this would be my guess. I would think it would have upset the mechanism as the parent said. Making the shaft the DVD sits on slightly crooked or off place, maybe hitting the laser or something so that it doesn't aim/focus correctly. If you're willing, open up the drive (or the drive in the stand alone player) and see if you can see anything. The disc might have scratched the lens or some such. My guess is it's something reparable like that. It may be something you can fix with an adjustment screw and a little time.

If it is something "good" though (like scratching the lens or something), then go after the manufacturer of the disk or the place that rented it to you (if you rented it) and ask that they do something about it. They should be nice enough. If not, you may want to go through small claims court as another poster suggested. And if you keep the "killer" disc, you'll have great evidence.

Heard of something similar

[Ondo]

A similar incident was mentioned on the DVDAuthor users mailing list. Here's a link.

Some players unfreeze

[doc modulo]

after you disconnect the power cord for a while.

Re:Disc balance ?

[lythotype]

You have no idea what you're talking about, do you?

The infamous "click of death", was not because of "...read heads were ripping off..."

The following quote is from the link provided above, "The clicking sound itself is nothing more than the sound of the heads being retracted from the cartridge into the drive then immediately reinserted."