Why are European and American DVDs in different formats?

[Reverend_Smitty]

I have a friend who unknowingly bought a movie from the UK (he didn't know about the format difference) and now it is essentially as useful as a coaster to him. VHS cassettes are different as well, does anyone have an explanation as to why it is different?

[bikebloke]

1. Lines on the screen

European televisions are PAL, which I believe have more lines than the american NTSC. So when you get a European production, say like Masterpiece Theater fare made in the UK, they have to convert it to NTSC. There are DVD players that play both formats and all regions.

[HarukaTheTrophyWife]

2. To be a fucking pain in the ass.

That's why I have a multi-region DVD player.

[Reverend_Smitty]

4. are they much more expensive than regular DVD players?

I was thinking of buying a new one, since my current machine is quite old and for some reason can't play burned DVDs

[HarukaTheTrophyWife]

5. This is what I have.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0007M65XM/sr=8-2/qid=1150477334/ref=pd_bbs_2/002-1256403-1714469?%5Fencoding=UTF8

It's under $100. I haven't played burned DVDs on it, but it says you can. I like it. Never any problems.

[Reverend_Smitty]

6. It looks like a good deal

the DVD that we got back in 99 has half the features and probably cost 3 times as much as this one.

[Kellanved]

10. most DVD players can be convinced to forget about their region

Google is your friend ;-)

[HarukaTheTrophyWife]

11. Yeah, but if you're in the market for a new one anyway,

it's easier just to buy region-free.

[Deja Q]

3. Money

It's not just being in a different format. It's easy to change the format.

It's about licensing costs and profits because more distributors have to be involved.

[ikri]

7. It's usually possible

To reprogram your DVD player to be multi-region.

Since it makes more financial sense to manufacture all DVD players to work anywhere before shipping them around the world than it does to manufacture separate batches per region most players (90% of major manufacturer types anyway) have a debugging/technical menu where you can reset the region.

It's usually just a case of googling the specific DVD player for instructions.

[shugh514]

8. Most players can be made region-free

without too much trouble. Search for the model# of the player + "region-free" and you may find a solution. For mine I just needed to press a sequence of numbers on the remote.

[Kellanved]

9. For several reasons; money being the important one

Movies and DVDs have different release dates. To protect the investment there is a code built in into the DVD standard, which is supposed to ensure that no import/free trade of DVDs happens. Free trade is just for companies, customers are forbidden to participate.


Historical there is also the standard incompatibility. The USA use a 60Hz power grid, which led to TVs syncing at 60Hz in the US; in Europe it is 50Hz for both values. The different values cause European TVs to have slightly more time for each picture, causing a higher resolution. A TV signal not synced wouldn't stay in position, but run through (you see that sometimes with defective TVs).
Then there is a difference in the TV color standards. However, that has zero impact on DVDs; it was just important for VHS and is simply used as an excuse today.

Today, with digital videos and HDTV TV sets, there is absolutely no technical reason for the incompatibility.

[catmandu57]

12. I'd wait to replace a dvd player

they're supposed to change from red light laser to blue light, I've heard that the blue light gives a better resolution, but I don't know that much about it.
It sounds like a reason to sell everyone new players and dvds just in time for christmas.

[Kellanved]

14. It's a pretty good time, actually

DVD players are cheap and work.

The HD players aren't looking too promising:

-There are two standards, no way to say if one, both or neither will survive
-so far neither standard is complete; early players might turn out to be incompatible later
-the players available right now are expensive ($1000) and don't work properly
-There is no real advantage of HD videos in a standard living room; especially not on an old TV set
-HD videos come with an insane copyright scheme, which practically guarantees that nobody can actually watch the movies in HD.
-almost no HD videos are available.

[billyskank]

13. As for VHS cassettes

that's because of the different analogue encodings. I don't know what they mean, but in britain we use PAL (phased alternate line). In France they use SECAM, which is almost compatible with PAL but not quite. You americans use NTSC, which one wag friend of mine once claimed stood for "Never Twice the Same Colour."

[Kellanved]

15. Nah; that's irrelevant for digital videos

The signal is created in the player and most people use component cables, SCART (RGB), S-Video or something similar to hook up their DVD player - no PAL/SECAM/NTSC in there; those were just used for analog broadcasts and tapes.
The color standard never was a problem anyway; it just caused the image to be black and white.

The real problem was the number of frames per seconds, linked to the refresh rate of the TV, which in turn is traditionally linked to the frequencies in the power grids.
But the issue hasn't been an issue for years - most sets work fine at 50Hz and 60Hz; with HDTV there won't be any difference anymore.

It's just plain market protectionism.

[billyskank]

16. Sure

definitely protectionism.

In the old days technology differences segmented their markets for them. When the opportunity to remove these barriers arose the copyright barons insisted that they be artificially enforced.
:nuke:

[tjwmason]

17. It's money.

As shown by the existence of Region 0 discs.

If one strays into the realms of more esoteric or specialist content it is frequently the case that a D.V.D. will not have a regional coding - which means that it can be used anywhere.