Computer question

Dear Group,

I picked up an external DVD unit for my laptop (ICY Box caddy and a NEC DVD double-layer unit) so as to view as well as read/write DVD's.

I can easily peruse the directory on my logical "E:" drive where a DVD is placed. However, I cannot play the contents using Windows Media Player ("compatible DVD encoder not found") etc. Any advice would be very much appreciated. I should mention that the driver CD which came with the hardware will not autorun or list when loaded and this is somehing I have encountered on other occasions as well with my Windows XP system.

So as to not to be totally off-topic, I have some space-related DVD's I am trying to load and play.

While I am at it, are there any free utitilies for converting VOB files to another format such AVI, MPEG etc?

Thanks in advance!

Anthony.

Anthony,

Windows media player relies on an mpeg decoder to play DVD files. You will need a DVD player program with an inbuilt MPEG decoder built in I use WinDVD because it came with a DVD drive I bought. I find it works well. I might suggest that you try BSPlayer as a free open source alternative.

I'm not sure why your autorun wont work. Check the driver settings. I have seen a 'Disable Autorun' checkbox there sometimes.

As for software to turn VOBs into mpegs etc. I spent a whole night once looking for a free utility. I eventually gave up and bought Cucusofts DVD ripper to do the job (purely for legal purposes of course

There is another utility I could tell you about but I'd incur the wrath of Bart if I did :shock: so I'll email you about it!

BTW congrats of your eclipse picture in Sky and Telescope this month. Truly well deserving of its lofty spot!!

Anthony,

The encoder should be on the CD you mention. To change the Autorun settings, go into My Computer, and you should see a link under "Devices with Removable Storage" -- something like "CD RW drive". Right-click on that and choose Properties. This will bring up a dialog box with some tabs across the top. Choose Autoplay. Each of the media types a cd can contain is listed in the drop-down menu near the top. Chances are, one of yours is set to "take no action", but if you change them all to "Prompt me each time to choose an action", you should at least be able to get a folder listing when you put in a CD.

In the root directory of the CD, there should be a file named something like install.exe that installs the driver.

Best of luck!

Seán

Gentlemen,

Thank you for the assistance and leads. I have a temporary solution (Xilisoft DVD Ripper plus associated registration code from an unnamed site ) and I will address a more permanent and elegant solution shortly.

Sean, I loaded the software CD onto the new unit and it is able to read it without a problem (I guess my laptop's CD unit may be flaky). The CD is specifically for Windows 98 (perhaps why my CD unit originally ignored it) and, as such, no decoder. However, I have other options in this regard I plan to pursue.

I thank both of you for your help!

Anthony.