Quote: I'm working on a training video that is intended to be distributed worldwide. I have seen DVD's for sale indicating that they work on all DVD players in all countries. "This DVD plays in all DVD and Blu-ray players worldwide, both NTSC and PAL encoded TV's will play this DVD on your Television" I understand that PD generates region 0 (all) output, but what about NTSC vs PAL format? I am using PD13, with a collection of AVI files as my original source, and given the size of the collection, will be burning to dual layer 8.5gb disks. What settings would I need to use to generate a DVD that can play worldwide in both NTSC and PAL players? Thank you in advance for your assistance.

It's not a region code issue, yes PD creates region free discs.

There is not a feature in PD to make a 100% compatible disc, PAL/NTSC. However, for DVD, it's been published that ~95% of the world's standalone DVD players can read NTSC. For playing NTSC DVDs in Europe - all PAL DVD players output NTSC, and MOST PAL TVs will display NTSC with no problems. Conversely, most NTSC players can't play PAL discs but this depends heavily on the age/brand of the player.

With the cheap cost of DVD's, why not just include both and label as such? If not a option, NTSC will be more compatible worldwide.

Ever considered a different ditsribution media, how many of your clients would play your training video on standalone DVD player vs computer? Are you really planning to manually burn each DL disc, 8-10min process if full, vs having them stamped someplace? A 8GB flsh drive in bulk can be very cheap, and fast to write to if doing a manual operation.

Jeff

Thanks Jeff; NTSC it is. I'm planning on hand-burning the first 20 or so, and make sure I'm done with all edits and that no one's DVD players explode. Then I'll get several hundred burned professionally with the artwork printed on. In quantities of 300 or so I can get them for around $1.75; and down to under a buck for 1000. I'm really hoping to get to that point in sales. Thanks again.

Quote:
There is not a feature in PD to make a 100% compatible disc, PAL/NTSC. However, for DVD, it's been published that ~95% of the world's standalone DVD players can read NTSC. For playing NTSC DVDs in Europe - all PAL DVD players output NTSC, and MOST PAL TVs will display NTSC with no problems. Conversely, most NTSC players can't play PAL discs but this depends heavily on the age/brand of the player.

It certainly wasn't the case for a very long time that most TVs in Europe accepted NTSC input - at least in the days of CRTs and sing composite or s-video connections, it was not . This may very well have changed now. Most of the old TVs in France only accepted PAL or SECAM on their video inputs, but not NTSC. This was the case well into the mid-2000s.

However, many TVs then featured RGB SCART inputs, which provided much better color reproduction than composite or s-video, and better than component video as well.

From what I recall, many DVD players in Europe don't actually output NTSC on s-video or composite connections but a bastardized "PAL60" format that many (but not all) TVs are able to accept.

However, composite and s-video are rarely used anymore, at least, not if you want the best picture. So, the PAL/NTSC becomes meaningless. On component and HDMI connections, there is actually no PAL or NTSC color encoding. But the signal can still be 50 or 60 frames per second, at various resolutions. And the TV's scaler needs to be able to accomodate the various formats. Most HDTVs support a large number of modes over HDMI, at both 50 or 60fps, so, if using a player with an HDMI connection and a modern LCD TV with a scaler, it really doesn't matter whether the source material is in 50 or 60fps, or even 24fps. I would use what matches the source camera the best. MSI X99A Raider
Intel i7-5820k @ 4.4 GHz
32GB DDR4 RAM
Gigabyte nVidia GTX 960 4GB
480 GB Patriot Ignite SSD (boot)
2 x 480 GB Sandisk Ultra II SSD (striped)
6 x 1 TB Samsung 860 SSD (striped)

2 x LG 32UD59-B 32" 4K
Asus PB238 23" HD (portrait)

Hello, "TheCoder"!

It isn't whether you use NTSC or PAL-encoded discs that will be your problem. The "brick wall" you're about to slam headlong into will be the use of dual-layer(8.5 Gb DVD-9) discs. While computer DVD drives will happily play home-burn dual-layer discs, standalone DVD players will "spit the dummy" on any such disc where they'll happily play commercially-made dual-layer DVDs. This has been my experience with dual-layer discs, so much so that, when I do use them now, it's only to "archive" content if I don't want to keep it on a hard-drive. If you're intending your product to be available world-wide, you need to burn to the disc as MPEG-2 and have a deal with a company who can make commercial-like versions of your dual-layer DVD for public market. What's the difference, you ask? A home-burn DVD has a purplish-coloured playing surface while the commercial disc playing surface has a silver-coloured appearance.

Cheers!

Neil.

Quote: It certainly wasn't the case for a very long time that most TVs in Europe accepted NTSC input - at least in the days of CRTs and sing composite or s-video connections, it was not . This may very well have changed now. Most of the old TVs in France only accepted PAL or SECAM on their video inputs, but not NTSC. This was the case well into the mid-2000s.

However, many TVs then featured RGB SCART inputs, which provided much better color reproduction than composite or s-video, and better than component video as well.

From what I recall, many DVD players in Europe don't actually output NTSC on s-video or composite connections but a bastardized "PAL60" format that many (but not all) TVs are able to accept.

However, composite and s-video are rarely used anymore, at least, not if you want the best picture. So, the PAL/NTSC becomes meaningless. On component and HDMI connections, there is actually no PAL or NTSC color encoding. But the signal can still be 50 or 60 frames per second, at various resolutions. And the TV's scaler needs to be able to accomodate the various formats. Most HDTVs support a large number of modes over HDMI, at both 50 or 60fps, so, if using a player with an HDMI connection and a modern LCD TV with a scaler, it really doesn't matter whether the source material is in 50 or 60fps, or even 24fps. I would use what matches the source camera the best.

Julien Pierre, thanks, I will see if I can notify the author of the book, Mr. Taylor, that some of his info in the book is incorrect and reference your knowledge here.

For the OP, you can read for yourself a very small subset of the book in a FAQ form concerning DVD systems worldwide here http://www.dvddemystified.com/dvdfaq.html#1.19 with attention to his "Bottom line:" conclusion.

Jeff

Quote: Hello, "TheCoder"!

It isn't whether you use NTSC or PAL-encoded discs that will be your problem. The "brick wall" you're about to slam headlong into will be the use of dual-layer(8.5 Gb DVD-9) discs. While computer DVD drives will happily play home-burn dual-layer discs, standalone DVD players will "spit the dummy" on any such disc where they'll happily play commercially-made dual-layer DVDs. This has been my experience with dual-layer discs, so much so that, when I do use them now, it's only to "archive" content

Which is why I refuse to use them anymore. None of them worked.

I have a Pro Duplicator 1 to 3 that burns 3 DVDs at a time. A Canon printer prints the discs. I've got it so by the time 3 discs come out of the duplicator, the printer is ready for them. 100 discs really isn't that much work. I can sit here watching a movie on TV in the time it takes. .
.
Never, under any circumstances, combine a laxative and sleeping pill on the same night.

PowerSpec G310
ASRock Extreme 6 A85X
AMD A10 6800K Quad Core Processor 4.1GHz
16GB DDR3-1600 RAM
EVGA GTX960 Super OC GPU
Windows 7 Pro

Actually to me no correction is needed to DVD Demystified. People will always disagree because they may not have firsthand knowledge. PAL and NTSC video signal is different and a TV circuitry made to display one will not display the other. What was said is that most DVD player sold in PAL countries can play both: "These multi-standard players partially convert NTSC to a 60-Hz PAL (4.43 NTSC) signal. The player uses the PAL 4.43-MHz color subcarrier encoding format but keeps the 525/60 NTSC scanning rate. Most modern PAL TVs can handle this "pseudo-PAL" signal." At no time did he ever say a PAL TV can play a NTSC signal and vice versa.

Here in the states, one can play a PAL region 2 disc on a ntsc TV with no problem. Tech savy people buy those cheap DVD players made in China and apply the hacks to make them region free like the Apex, Norcent brands, etc. of yesteryear. The conversion is done in the DVD player and every 6th scan line is removed so that the 576 scan line to reduced to 480 scan lines for ntsc. That article was meant for a layman and gives just enough information for a user to investigate what one need to do to watch dvd meant for a different region. The answer is simple. Buy a multiregion dvd player. The techy can possibly do it himself.

Quote: Here in the states, one can play a PAL region 2 disc on a ntsc TV with no problem.

I guess strictly speaking a TV cannot "play" a disc, it needs a player to create a valid signal for TV to display.

For fun I took a PD13 created PAL region free disc and a PD13 created NTSC region free disc to the office and tried in 23 conference rooms equipped with AV equipment. Various brand players, various TV's from CRT, LED to a couple of plasma, (roughly 2000-2014 vintage equipment) some HDMI, some RCA, just a smear of stuff. It would take me too many hours to get actual models as they are all mounted in cabinets. PAL disc playback was functional in 1 of 23, NTSC disc playback functional in 23 of 23. Not real good for desired Worldwide readability of OP goal. Playback error for PAL disc was typically "Video in the PAL broadcast is not supported" or similar, never a incorrect region code error.

Not real surprising, no techy mods to any of the equipment, all just US purchased.

Tried the same at home with two players connected to the same LED TV via HDMI, 1 of 2 playback functional for PAL disc, 2 of 2 for NTSC. The Sony PS3 playback chokes with PAL broadcast error message.

I think my original recomendation still stands, provide both PAL/NTSC if you can, if not, NTSC will be more worldwide compatible.

Jeff

I don't disagree with you as I shot, edited, and created ntsc dvds about 10 years ago and gave it to a party's relative who took them back to England who reported that they played okay in their PAL dvd players overseas. I am sure that there will always be exceptions as Julien has pointed out. France used SECAM at one time.

I and others have always been able to view foreign dvds purchased abroad while traveling in PAL countries. The Apex AD600a played them all for instance. Your suggestion is on the mark.

Hi, All!

It's not surprising that France abandoned their own SECAM colour system in favour of the vastly superior German-developed PAL system. The SECAM system could not cope with switching cameras(typical TV station newsroom setting: switch from newsreader to sports reporter or weather presenter, severe discolouration occurs) For that reason the TV stations equipped their studios in PAL system gear(cameras, videotape, telecine, control desks and othernecessary gear) and only transcoded to SECAM at the transmitter. Looks like they've given SECAM away completely by now. SECAM was, by far the worst system ever developed. That's why DVDs are encoded either in PAL or NTSC.

But that was not the point of my comment, as such. It was more to do with what type of disc, to which "TheCoder" was burning content. DVD-5(single layer 4.7Gb) is fine. Domestic DVD players will handle them without problems. DVD-9(dual layer 8.5Gb) however, is a different story. Computer DVD drives will handle them, domestic DVD players "spit the dummy" and will not play them at all. For me, I always use single layer discs, burned to DVD SP quality, so I can fit a little over two hours worth of content onto my discs, making full use of their capacity where possible.

Cheers!

Neil.