DVD shows “Read Error” at the same spot on multiple drives but plays fine on a standalone player – why?

[mikasabaggins]

Hi everyone,
I have an old DVD movie. When I try to rip it with MakeMKV, it always gives a “Read Error” at the same sector, even when I try two different drives (one PC drive and one USB drive). However, the DVD plays perfectly fine on my standalone DVD player with no freezes.

I’m wondering:

Why can’t MakeMKV or PC drives read this part, but the standalone DVD player can?

Could this be due to the disc’s dye layer degrading, or is it because DVD players handle errors differently than PC drives?

Is there any method to recover the data or successfully rip the problematic section (like using different software, slower reading, or special disc cleaning techniques)?

Thanks in advance for your help!

[Coopervid]

Hi everyone,
I have an old DVD movie. When I try to rip it with MakeMKV, it always gives a “Read Error” at the same sector, even when I try two different drives (one PC drive and one USB drive). However, the DVD plays perfectly fine on my standalone DVD player with no freezes.

I’m wondering:

Why can’t MakeMKV or PC drives read this part, but the standalone DVD player can?

Could this be due to the disc’s dye layer degrading, or is it because DVD players handle errors differently than PC drives?

Is there any method to recover the data or successfully rip the problematic section (like using different software, slower reading, or special disc cleaning techniques)?

Thanks in advance for your help!

Standalone players just skip unreadable parts. If small you won't even notice that.

[rjnichols]

Would be really nice if MAKEMKV could have an option to set skip unreadable sectors as last resort for problem discs to act like standalone players.
I have 10 older disks out of more than 8000 now that are now exhibiting unreadable SCSII errors that were fine when I first ripped them when they were new. All the disks play perfectly in my standalone Panasonic UP-DB9000

[forestercitizen]

You can try: using different software (DVD Decrypter, AnyDVD, ddrescue), using different types of drives, reducing the reading speed, cleaning/polishing the disc, or finally recording the movie with a capture card while playing it from the DVD player.

[MartyMcNuts]

Would be really nice if MAKEMKV could have an option to set skip unreadable sectors as last resort for problem discs to act like standalone players.
I have 10 older disks out of more than 8000 now that are now exhibiting unreadable SCSII errors that were fine when I first ripped them when they were new. All the disks play perfectly in my standalone Panasonic UP-DB9000

You could try creating an ISO of the DVD and use it for ripping to MKV. Or other, older DVD software such as DVDshrink, DVDdecrypter etc.

[flojo]

You can use "ddrescue" or if you're not computer savvy and it's just a DVD you could use Padus Discjuggler (~20yrs old) which will fill missing sectors with null bytes (eg. \0). Of course as long as you can mount it you can run anything you want over the file system to attempt recovery.

Link to last Discjuggler and .CDI plugin: https://dreamcast.wiki/DiscJuggler