Playing burned DVDs on dvd player

[Serene]

Okay, here's a little back story before I get to my question. Sorry if it's long. I was able to make an image of one of my workout videos from Disk Utility and then successfully burned it on a 4GB DVD-R disk. The workout video wasn't that big a file so it fit on the 4GB disk. It also plays fine on my iMac G5 and on a regular dvd player, no skipping or antyhing.

Then I tried to make a copy of my Stuck on You DVD (funny movie. Love it!). I just got Toast and wanted to try it out. Well, since it was encrypted, I couldn't copy it on Toast. So downloaded Mac the Ripper. So it did it's thing and copied the movie, etc. So I put the Video_TS folder into Toast to compress the movie to fit into a 4GB disk. Right near the end when it was verifying the dvd, an error comes up. I forgot what it said, but anyway, I think I pressed cancel or whatever and it was done.

So I watched the movie on my iMac to see if it worked. It looked fine, until I got near the end when the twins were wanting to be separated. Anyway, at that point the whole thing just stops. The other thing is, when I play it on a regular dvd player, the movie just keeps stopping for like every 2 seconds.

So, I guess I have a few questions. Did something happen(I guess besides the error while it was verifying)? Why does it keep stopping every 2 seconds on a regular dvd player? Is it not suppose to be played on a DVD player? Seems stupid to burn the dvd in the first place if you can only watch it on your computer. Does it matter what speed is used when it is burning? Toast only has 1x and 2x, but the DVD-R label says "High Speed 1~8x". Sorry for the really long post. I just wanted to make sure I described it completely. Thank you so, so much to anyone who has answers!

Serene

[albloom]

Serene, if Toast gives you a verify error, you have a coaster.
Toss the disc and try again.

If you have Sony 1-8's, toss them. You'll get more coasters
than good copies.

[Mikuro]

I think the Toast error explains the behavior on your Mac. Errors are errors. It happens.

For dedicated DVD players, you need to be careful. Since they don't operate at high speed like PC DVD drives, any error will create skipping. On your Mac, if the drive has trouble reading a sector, it has time to try a few times before the problem creates skipping. On a dedicated DVD player, it has to work perfectly.

For this reason, it's generally recommended to burn your DVDs at the lowest possible speed. This creates less variation on the surface, making it easier for drives to read it properly. The same applies to CDs, too (although I don't think that's really a problem with modern players).

Also, are you sure your DVD player can play DVD-R discs? I assume any player that can play them at all should be able to play them properly given a good disc, but you should look up your player at http://www.videohelp.com to be sure. Keep in mind that there are four major writable DVD formats (more if you count the dual-layer variants), and they all have different drive compatibility.