Cannot Open Home Recorded DVD-R

Neil_Jones

Okay so I think the disk has gone bad then.  You may be out of luck I'm afraid.

Where have you kept these discs?  Not next to a magnetic storage like speakers for example or in the sun?  There is such a thing as "disc rot," which causes discs to become unreadable due to oxidation.  CDs and DVDs are read by a laser that bounces light off the shiny surface below the clear plastic layer that protects it; oxidation will dull the shiny layer over time, making it harder to read.  This page might be of interest: https://eu.azcentral.com/story/money/business/tech/2016/05/20/ken-colburn-do-cds-and-dvds-wear-out/84634710/

greyteam1959

The discs have been stored with other DVD-R discs in a wooden drawer with nothing else.
I fear it may be something to do with finalising the dvd's when i recorded them.
Strange thing is they are unreadable i.e whatever I try to do I can't see any files on the discs.....but I know they are there !!
Oh well gone for good I fear.
Thanks for all the help.

Neil_Jones

Moral of the story here:  If its important to you, back it up and back it up again.  I presume you don't have the original video tapes anymore?

George_Michael

Have you tried more than one DVD player as it's a possibility that the player itself is at fault.
The laser used will transmit on different frequencies depending on the type of disc that is inserted and these lasers do occasionally go faulty. Another possibility is the software for the laser driver is playing up.
It would be worth using a good quality laser lens cleaner just in case there is a smudge or bit of muck on there which is blocking a certain frequency of laser light.

As mentioned above, disc rot does happen but it would be extremely unlikely that all 6 discs have suffered from this.

greyteam1959

The original video tapes are long gone sadly.

wongataa

greyteam1959 said:

The discs have been stored with other DVD-R discs in a wooden drawer with nothing else.
I fear it may be something to do with finalising the dvd's when i recorded them.
Strange thing is they are unreadable i.e whatever I try to do I can't see any files on the discs.....but I know they are there !!
Oh well gone for good I fear.
Thanks for all the help.

Really it is more like the discs have just degraded enough to fail.  It happens.

AstonSmith

George_Michael said:

Have you tried more than one DVD player as it's a possibility that the player itself is at fault.
...
As mentioned above, disc rot does happen but it would be extremely unlikely that all 6 discs have suffered from this.

If all the discs were from the same batch, then actually I'd say it was unfortunate but much more likely that they all suffered the same fate. But trying all the discs in multiple different players is an extremely good idea.
My own personal experience: I've burned 1000s of discs over the past 20 years (although < 10 this year) and every single DVD-R DL I wrote from a particular brand in 2012 now has a completely unreadable second layer.

forgotmyname

Time to google data recovery the software is out there but it will take a few days and will give lots of useless files, anything more

than a few KB maybe something useful, you need to do a RAW scan of the discs.

sweetgirl2015

Don't give up hope. Try them on other dvd players. I have a panasonic dvd recorder and I could try one of the discs on my player if you like? If you private message me I could add my address there. And try the dvd and either way send it back to you. 

Carrot007

Did you use decent quality media?

And that is not the "make" but the manufacturer (as along as not faked). There were a lot of bad disks around years ago. Ones that often would not verifry after writing. And unfortunatly using disk for video made some that would appear to work and then fail for this sort of thing, chjecking with a computer was the only way to verify integrity.

Also do note that cost was never a reliable indicator of quality.

Your only option (other than the cost of "professional" recovery (which is likely not much more unless you use the couple of good companies) is to use many different readers to try and rip the disk. This will need to be done on a computer.