I need some help. I've searched and found nothing particularly helpful for this situation.

I have a Samsung dvd vr-330. Actually, I'm on my second one it two days and even this one just will not work. I bought dvd +/- rw's and dvd -r's and even thought the disks are ' Finalized' , they refuse to play in any other player, even computers. They are being Finalized in DVD-VR.

Anyway, this device was to be used to copy old VHS tapes to dvd's - but for the life of me, I can not figure out why the dvd's will not play on other players after being Finalized. *sigh*

If someone has some other ideas, that would be great. I am Only looking for a product that has: a dvd recorder, vcr, NTSC (analog tuner) and actually does it's job from recording vcr to dvd and cable to dvd - - and works with other players!

Thanks.

Edit:

I did find this post in some Amazon.com reviews:

" but I found that you should finalize the discs as DVD Video, NOT as DVD-VR which is the default setting unfortunately. Samsung should have made the default record setting DVD Video instead. DVD-VR is proprietary and as such won't work everywhere. "

Anyone have any ideas how to do this?

They are being Finalized in DVD-VR.



Yes, that is your problem. They need to be recorded in Video Mode, then finalized. I am not familiar with Samsung DVDRs, but I think you will have to stop it from initializing the disc in VR mode. To record in Video Mode, discs do not have to be initialized, but to record in VR mode, they have to be initialized. If the disc is recorded in Video Mode, it will finalize in Video Mode. I would assume that somewhere in your Menu, perhaps in setup, you need to select Video Mode, before inserting a disc, so it is not auto initialized to VR mode.

kjbawc is correct. Look on page 86 of the manual and you will see:

DVD-RW
• You will be prompted with the confirmation
message ‘Choose the recording format for
DVD-RW.’

The choices are DVD-VR and DVD-V.

This choice is only available for DVD-RW discs.

Make sure that you choose DVD-V or your discs will be unplayable except in players that can handle VR-recorded DVDs.

Good luck.

Thanks guys, that seems to have worked. DVD-V and not DVD-VR mode. What is the real difference between the two modes?

The only issue I'm having now is that the DVD-V 'finalized' disk will not work with one my dvd players. :( One of the players goes back to a 1999 model Pinoneer. Do you guys think it is too old to play the disks? :confused: It works in both the computers that I have....

Thanks for the help.

EDIT:

Looks as though the '02 Panny works OK with video and audio but the Pionneer from 1999 just doesn't want to cooperate -- as in read the disk at all. It comes up with "Cannot Read Disk."

Any ideas besides trash it?

I have no experience with that 1999 player, but it is well known that many older players will not play DVD-R/RW, or DVD+R/RW discs, only pressed discs. I doubt that it can be changed, but if the player still works, I wouldn't throw it in the trash!

I have no experience with that 1999 player, but it is well known that many older players will not play DVD-R/RW, or DVD+R/RW discs, only pressed discs. I doubt that it can be changed, but if the player still works, I wouldn't throw it in the trash!

I kind of figured it was because it was just too old. It does still work - I won't throw it out just yet... :D

I'm still in the "take it back in 30 days if it doesn't fit my need" mode, so I'm giving the Samsung DVD-VR330 a little more time -- However, it has already decided that it wanted to keep a VCR tape in it, so I had to unplug it to get it to spit it back out!! I've only had it like 3 days! :mad: We shall see. Thanks for the responses guys.

** By the way, does anyone know if the Sony DVP-NS77H DVD player is a good one? It's upconverted and has HDMI. Just curious if anyone has any thoughts about it.............

The previous posts may be the answer to the problem I had. I attempted to play a commercial disc on my Panny recorder and it couldn't read - I thought it was a bad disc, then I tried it in my older Insignia dvd/vhs and it worked fine.

Looks as though the '02 Panny works OK with video and audio but the Pionneer from 1999 just doesn't want to cooperate -- as in read the disk at all. It comes up with "Cannot Read Disk."
If you look at the bottom of a commercial pressed DVD and one you have made yourself, they have vastly different levels of shininess. Some older players can not play disks whose reflectivity is under a certain (large) percentage. All newer players can play back disks with very bad reflectivity. This could very well be the issue your older player is having.

If you look at the bottom of a commercial pressed DVD and one you have made yourself, they have vastly different levels of shininess. Some older players can not play disks whose reflectivity is under a certain (large) percentage. All newer players can play back disks with very bad reflectivity. This could very well be the issue your older player is having.

Interesting. Never really noticed. The player is due to be replaced sooner than later anyway to an upconverted dvd w/hdmi for my hdtv. The disks from the samsung dvd-vr330 recorder seem to work on most of the other machines, which is good because I've got a lot of home movies with people who are no longer with us.
Thanks Church AV Guy.