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Posted by def456 on 05/13/07 13:45
It could be your DVD player. I tried out several cheapo DVD players from
Walmart and Sears a few years ago. Most of them didn't work right - skipped,
froze, weak sound, etc. Rule of thumb: Get one that costs at least $50 and
forget about anything cheaper. I settled on an Emerson model for about $65
and it still works fine. When checking the sound, be sure to set Dolby
Digital to OFF on the player, and set your TV to MONO, unless you happen to
have a Dolby Digital decoder. Most TVs are incompatible with Dolby Digital,
causing weak sound, particularly the older 4:3 models.
Or it could be the discs. Usually they just need to be cleaned. There are
several ways to do it. The easiest and quickest is to lay the disc on a
paper towel on a flat surface, playing side up, and squirt it with a little
window cleaner. Then rub with a kleenix from the inner hub to the outer
edge, in a straightline motion. Never rub in circular motions. Go around the
disc in this fashion til it looks like all the gunk is removed. Then in
similar fashion, dry it with a dry kleenix.
There's another method to use when that one fails. Holding the disc with the
left hand, squirt some liquid dish washing soap on the playing surface. Then
with the righthand fingers move the soap around til it completely coats the
surface. Now you use your right thumb in the same fashion as you used the
kleenix above. Rub with the thumb from the inner hub to the outer edge in
straightline motions. Go around the disc in that fashion. Then hold the disc
under luke warm water from the faucet and go around the disc again with your
right thumb, this time pressing the disc firmly between your right thumb and
forefinger. What this does is rub off any water insolubles using friction.
Pay particular attention to any visible spots of gunk on the disc. You may
have to rub the spots repeatedly, which moves the gunk gradually towards the
outer edge then off the disc. Who knows what it is? One possibility is
adhesives from labels, which is water insoluble. Because your thumb is wet
and clean and smooth from the soap, it won't scratch the disc. This assumes
you don't have any hard calluses on your thumb. Finally, blot (not rub) it
dry between paper towels on a flat surface.
If those cleaning methods fail, it could be caused by scratches on the disc.
There are polishers that may be able to remove the the scratches but most
people don't have one. I've never tried polishing them.
<bob@coolgroups.com> wrote in message
news:1178987720.039433.231770@p77g2000hsh.googlegroups.com...
>I started checking out DVDs from the library, and occasionally a scene
> does not play correctly. Is this a common problem probably due to
> scratches on the disc, or should I look into getting a better DVD
> player?
>
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