DVDs won't play on some equipment

I have been burning DVDs of home movies, using Ulead Video Studio and Sonic Record Now on my HP Pavillion (Athelon 3200, DVD Writer 300n).

The home burned DVD's work perfectly on my $35 CyberHome DVD player. However, problems often occur when I try to play them on friends' DVD players that they paid much more money for.

Problems usually involve the movie freezing on a frame, jumpy viewing or just
plain defective output.

I am perfectly happy with my choice of the CyberHome unit. It plays DVD, SDVD, VCD, Audio CD and MP3 without a hitch. I have disks that will work on some DVD players but not others. It is disapointing when I take a disk of a summer barbeque or ski trip to a friend's house and it won't play on their equipment.

What is the diifrence between DVD players? Can anyone provide some thoughts on this problem or perhaps suggest a site that might provide more technical info?

What features should a buyer look for to provide more consistant universal playback.

 

http://www.videohelp.com/dvdplayers is a useful site showing dvd compatibility lists.

 

Thanks for the site tip. Unfortunately, it does not seem to be working.

I'll try again tomorrow.

 

That site is loading because I was on it today. I just came from there and it is still loading fine so check your browser.

 

After testing "Home Brew" DVD's on several machines, I believe I have solved the problem of them hanging on some DVD players. The problem seems to be caused by LABELS! While my CyberHome System seems to be immune, or at least more forgiving, other machines just reject labeled DVD's. It may be due to the extra weight of the disk but who knows. Unlabeled DVD's work fine on machines that had rejected the ones with labels.