I just had two different DVD players stop working at the same time. One, a six year old Sony that had very little use on it stopped reading discs. Every disc I put in, it says “Cannot Read This Disc.” The other, a two year old RCA, is doing something really weird. With certain discs, the video cuts in and out. The audio is fine, but the video is normal for about three seconds, then quickly fades to blue, stays blue for five seconds, then pops back to normal, repeat. It only does this with certain discs, but it always screws up with the same ones and works with the same ones. Commercial or homemade discs, makes no difference, some of both work.
The Sony sounds like a lost cause, if it’s failing to read both burned and commercial DVDs. There’s not much point in even attempting to repair it, since it can be replaced for under $50 for a modern unit that’ll likely have new whizbang features the old one didn’t have. Getting it repaired would almost certainly exceed that amount.
The RCA one, however, is probably explainable. It sounds like what you’re seeing is Macrovision copy protection in action. Is the DVD player, by chance, hooked up to the TV through a VCR, or is the TV one of those TV/VCR all-in-one units? If so, Macrovision is almost certainly the culprit. Connect the DVD player directly to the TV, or to another TV without a built-in VCR.
I’m assuming, by the way, that the problem “homemade” DVDs are backups or duplicates of commercial DVDs that have Macrovision on them; if you’re getting the same problem with DVDs of your home movies, there may be something else going on.
Max, that’s probably it. I just got AT&T Uverse and was messing with the hookups, and I did run the DVD through the VCR because that TV only has 1 Aux input. Now I guess I need to change it so the UVerse box runs through the VCR instead.
Since I have nothing to lose, I’m going to take the Sony apart and see if there is anything obvious going on. Anything in particular I could look for?