Home audio & video forum: WHy won't my dvd player play dvd-r discs??

The player now sold shouldn't +/- preference. I am guessing this might have more to do with recording format of the original recorder (just guessing here). What kind of recorder was it? Is it still available ?

There are many reasons they may not be working for you. 1, many dvd recorders have to finalize the disc in order to play on anything else. It will play in the original recorder, sometime something else, but mostly they will not play on any other players until you finalize them, and since you no longer have that unit, you can't do that.
2, disc will go bad! depending on brand, storage conditions. I have had some go bad in as little as a year,(cheaper off brands) I have some still playing after 7 years. Anything I think is very important I burn on 2 disc of different brands and save on a hard drive. As long as the disc have not gone bad, as some others have said, you should be able to see them in a computer that will play dvd's. If they work there, then you should be able to copy them and then they would play in your regular dvd players. I never liked the way vhs to dvd recorder made the dvd's by putting chapter marks in, so once I dubbed a tape to dvd, I put the dvd in the computer and edit it all out. I hope number 1 is your problem as it can be recovered.

I had a similar experience with a home video I had recorded from a Sony Digital Video Tape to computer to a DVD disc. A few years later when I tried to view the DVD on two different stand-alone players, no video. When trying to view the DVD on my computer, the computer would crash. I was able to copy the video file from DVD to my computer and then downloaded a player called Final VIdeo Player. There were a few glitches in playback, but for the most part this player worked when nothing else would. Hope this helps.

What brand dvds did you burn them too? And how many did you do? There are some special software programs that may read them, as long as the disc have not deteriorated. As I mentioned earlier, it sounds like they were not finalized in the original recorder. Look at the disc(on the burned side) with a good bright light on the back, if you see light thru it in spots, the disc may be bad. Now shine the light on the burned side to see it the color changes from spot to spot, this is not a good sign. Of course it may look fine and still be bad. If you don't find a answer here, or someone local to help, I am always up to a challenge. In Columbia SC

Try copying one of the disks onto another disk using your computer (or another dvd recorder if you have one). Try both - and + disks. If your results are not successful, try using some type of DVD authoring software instead of plain old copying software. I use VideoRedo, but there are lots of others, including freeware. Since you're not trying to copy store-bought copy-protected disks, there are a lot of options.