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DVD Player

D

dejamoi

macrumors member
Original poster
Sep 21, 2005
43
0
Hey Everyone, :p

I just purchased a brand spanking new Mac Mini but it can't play DVD's! I just tried calling Apple Support but they are closed right now. Whenever I pop a DVD into the drive, the disk icon doesn't show up on the Desktop and when DVD Player starts it gives an error message (included in the picture). :confused: I don't think it's the drive because when I put CD's (like games, pictures, etc.) in the drive, the disk shows up and I can open it in the Finder. Please, someone help me! Thanks so much to anyone who can be of any help! :(

Bobby
 

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Yep.

Well the thing is, I actually had to take in the original Mac I bought because of colour problems and Rocky Horror played in it... And yes, I've tried different ones. The setting for when I pop a DVD in is "Open DVD Player."

Any ideas?

Bob
 
I have the same problem with my ibook. Same message on every DVD I try, copied or origional. I would love to find a solution to this.
 
Aw man...

I was hoping someone could help me but oh well; time to call Apple! Lol.
 
dejamoi said:
Hey Everyone, :p

I just purchased a brand spanking new Mac Mini but it can't play DVD's! I just tried calling Apple Support but they are closed right now. Whenever I pop a DVD into the drive, the disk icon doesn't show up on the Desktop and when DVD Player starts it gives an error message (included in the picture). :confused: I don't think it's the drive because when I put CD's (like games, pictures, etc.) in the drive, the disk shows up and I can open it in the Finder. Please, someone help me! Thanks so much to anyone who can be of any help! :(

Bobby
Click to expand...
Try to see if it's a software or a hardware problem. If it's a software problem, then an alternative program will be able to play the DVD. Try VLC.

If it's a hardware problem, then the disk will not be recognized in VLC either.

PS.Are you using the latest system version?
 
It's sounding just like a bad optical drive (hardware), and therefore a job for Apple. However, some DVD settings are kept in the PRAM. Try resetting it. :)

I doubt it'll work, but you may as well try.
 
VLC Didn't either... :(

When I poped in a DVD and previously set it to open VLC, it did, but it came up with an error window which repeated everytime I tried to play the DVD:

main: no suitable access module for `file://'
main: no suitable access module for `file://'
main: no suitable access module for `file://'
main: no suitable access module for `file://

Please, someone help me! I have no idea what this means... :(

Bob
 
dejamoi said:
Hey Everyone, :p

I just purchased a brand spanking new Mac Mini but it can't play DVD's! I just tried calling Apple Support but they are closed right now. Whenever I pop a DVD into the drive, the disk icon doesn't show up on the Desktop and when DVD Player starts it gives an error message (included in the picture). :confused: I don't think it's the drive because when I put CD's (like games, pictures, etc.) in the drive, the disk shows up and I can open it in the Finder. Please, someone help me! Thanks so much to anyone who can be of any help! :(

Bobby
Click to expand...
Not to be a smartass, but you are putting the DVD in right-side up??? I ask because I was trying to troubleshoot my dad's computer to no avail over the phone. As soon as I got there, I opened the CD drive and the CD was upside down. DOH!
 
DVD's not recognized

I have a similar problem on my Powerbook. It won't recognize DVDs. CDs are fine. I have preformed all the normal checks and fixes and have determined that is NOT a hardware issue in my case. If I startup from my external drive (bootable), the drive works perfectly. I have tried trashing DVD player prefs, Finder prefs, PRAM, re-install DVD Player (via Pacifist), etc. The only thing I have yet to do is an Archive & Install of OS X. I'm using 10.4.4 at this point and have over 100 apps I don't want to have to reinstall. I tried using VLC with no sucess. A Mac tech at CompUSA tole me that the region codeing was messed up (not sure why as I have never changed it) and he suggested the OSX reinstall. Any thoughts?
 
Lets think logically about this.

#1 - does the optical drive read CDs or ANY other optical media, including a different DVD?

YES - its not the drive
NO - its the drive
works with different DVD - its the disc itself

#2 - what region are the DVDs?

Region other than 1 - change your DVD player region to the correct one.


The error message means it can "see" the disc, but it cant read it.

VLC not being able to read it either seems to mean to me the drive is physically broken in some way.
 
Drive is OK

The optical drive works perfectly if I startup from an external hard drive. CD's or DVD's all recognized, so it's definitely a software issue. I'm hoping for a suggestion for fixing the problem without having to do an Archive & Install of the OS.
 
Sdashiki said:
YES - its not the drive
NO - its the drive
works with different DVD - its the disc itself
Click to expand...

Mmmm...maybe. There have been DVDs on and off that were incompatible with the playback software on different DVD players. The Matrix... at least the original pressing of the DVD... was a particular culprit. It didn't play on many early DVD players, but it plays on new ones. So that case, to me, is somewhere in between the lines you draw.
 
mkrishnan said:
Mmmm...maybe. There have been DVDs on and off that were incompatible with the playback software on different DVD players. The Matrix... at least the original pressing of the DVD... was a particular culprit. It didn't play on many early DVD players, but it plays on new ones. So that case, to me, is somewhere in between the lines you draw.
Click to expand...

what you are talking about was during the time when DVDs become SO popular and players became cheaper. What the problem was was that no one really had decided on a tried and true DVD standard for players to follow.

Which is why Samsung players needed Firmware upgrades to play some newer (infiniFilms especially) DVDs.

When the Matrix DVD came out, DVD wasnt a household word yet. And players were in their infancy. So it was expected early players would not play everything, much to the dismay of early buyers like me.

In the end even the crappiest DVD player bought TODAY can and will play 95% of all media, burned or otherwise.

The OP just needs to check the region encoding of his Discs and player.

other than that, I am clueless.

A search in the apple discussions with an exact quote of the error might pull up something.
 
Troubleshooting: some dvds will not play or I can get a dvd to play and then on another attempt the player does not recognize the dvd. Reasoning through this situation, it is not the hardware or the lens or reinstalling the player software. It is definitely software related, but I do not have the experience in finding where this could be located. I have been able to get un-readable dvds to play using a pc running windows media player. I put the unplayable dvd into the pc and use explore to show the video_ts folder. I then click on the .vob (any one of them it does not matter) file to play the dvd using wmp. By playing the dvd all the way through and then ejecting or by selecting root menu from wmp once the dvd has started playing the show and then ejecting, the dvd will then play in the mac (mac mini internal drive in my case). In just about every case, I have been able to get the dvd to play. I read online that computers write something to dvds when they are played and feel this could be the interference that is causing a playable dvd to become unrecognizable. My theory is that when it plays on wmp, there is no such write or it ejects the dvd "clean" and is therefore re-readable on the mac. Would need help from someone who has a better handle on what is happening with dvds and dvd players to solve this. It is really time consuming to get access to a pc and run through the dvd using wmp when I believe there should be a simple tweak on the mac to solve this.
 
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