I bought "The Negotiator" brand new from the store 4 years ago, watched it once and kept it in the box and never touched it again. Yesterday, I had the urge to watch this movie and spun it in my player. The player could not read it. I tried the disc in my computer's DVD ROM. No luck here either. The disc is completely unreadable.

The disc is brand new, untouched on the surface. It looks clean as a whistle with nary a scratch. I do not see any tell-tale signs of "Rot" either. In spite of that I tried washing it with soap and water anyway. No luck.

The first one that rotted in my collection was "Contact" from Warner. There are a few discs in my collection that have started pixellating and skipping. I NEVER lend my discs to anyone. I NEVER touch the surface of the discs. In spite of all this care, these discs are going bad on me.

I am afraid that my early collection from 5 years ago is gonna go belly up on me soon. I would be pissed the day when expensive stuff like LOTR EE rots.....

Thank goodness for Netflix, I am no longer a collector.

I'm pretty sure that this was a confirmed bad batch. regardless of what players you test on...be sure to list the make and model # of yer home deck, so others who may have the disc may compare. DVD-ROM is usually really good at reading bad discs, so if it's not playing on that, it dont look good. I'd try it on a buddies player or a store model player and see if it plays on anything. I've had my share of delaminated discs....but I still dont have one that refuses to read at all.

The computer CD drive also can be used to show the file system on DVDs, but it is not readable even on the CD drive.

My player is a Sony DVPC660 5 disc carousel. My DVD ROM is a Liteon model. The CD drive is a TDK burner.

I have also tested the disc on my 1998 model Sony DVPS-500D which is a rock solid player.

I wonder if Warner has a support e-mail which I could contact to ask for a replacement.

Ask Warner for a replacement of The Negotiator? This is about an $8 disc. If you're lucky, you may find one at your local Wal Mart in their discount racks. That's where I bought mine several months ago. I think it was one of those $8.88 deals.

He should try and get into contact with WB since the disc is obviously flawed. It may have taken four years to happen, but flawed nonetheless.

If the WB deal with Sony falls thru will we have the same type of discs in blu-ray someday, which can 'rot' like hobgoblins?

My Negotiator is about 6 years old, bought it a week before release at target back in december of 98, still plays like brand new, funny you should mention this but I just watched it 2 days ago

But we should not have to pay again for something that we have paid for already.

I am one of the early adopters of DVD and went on a buying binge in the 90s, collecting a sizeable amount of DVDs. I am waiting to see if and when these start dying, which is not a pleasant thought. If the old discs start failing one after the other, what do we do? Can we keep re-buying? The ironic thing is that the VHS tapes that I bought 10 years ago are still playable while my relatively younger DVD library is showing signs of old age with random pixellation in a couple of discs and complete non-playability in 1 disc and an officially "rotted" Contact disc.

I have stopped purchasing DVDs altogether nowadays and only rent from Netflix.

I bought mine from an online store (I believe it was reel.com or 800.com). My disc could be part of a bad batch of discs, unlike Contact, with which almost 100% of the buyers had problems.

Funny but I never had any problems with my copy of Contact

Not speaking to this specifically, but in a general sense, what gave you the idea that you only have to buy something once? Do you expect everything to last forever?

The disc in question lasted four years, maybe less. If dvds don't last at least 40- 50 years then frankly they're not worth buying.

WOW!! What a coincidence. Last night I went to try my VERTIGO disc with the original cover art, and it doesn't get read. It was one of the first DVD's I bought, and now I have a collection of 500 films....Hopefully this doesn't keep happening. For those of you keeping score, I tried it on my phillips DVD recorder DVDR989, my Panasonic A110, and my Samsung DVD M101. Oddly enough it does play on my Sony Vaio computer though. Truly Bizzare. It does me no good that it reads on my computer and not my DVDplayers because I want to see it on a big screen. I too have only seen it a few times, and never lend my movies to anyone. It looks as new as the day I bought it.

About a year ago I posted that my original Matrix DVD had stopped working correctly. The movie would start up O.K., but then pixelate and "freeze" during particular scenes. I tried it on a number of different DVD players and all had the same problems.

The DVD was in great shape and had never been loaned out. I purchased it online the week it was originally released on DVD. Luckily there was a price drop a while back, so I replaced the DVD cheaply. I guess I should have sent it back to WB, but no one else seemed to be having the same problem (my post gathered no comments from people experiencing the same thing).

The replacement copy I purchased works great.

I watched it 2 days ago, too!
Mine was new, though. Just got it from DDD.

have had no problems with my negotiator or contact... however, I will check them sometime soon to be sure... honestly, I have yet to have a problem with any of my DVDs...

I have yet to have any problems with unscratched discs - however, I have only been buying for 2 1/2 years, though I have bought some used discs which could be older.

Could someone elaborate for me - this is the first I have heard of this problem. Is it mainly with a particular studio (Warner?). Is it mainly older discs, or have some been bad when new?

I just popped in a perfect used copy of "The Negotiator" which I hadn't watched yet - later I will finally open and test my "Contact" disc which I got in a 2 pack at Costco earlier this year.

This discussion is making me nervous!!

This sounds like a good reason to make backups. Even if 1 goes bad, unlikely that both will.

This is the reason I very rarely buy DVDs anymore. I had a couple go bad and I'm not going to risk wasting tons of money on things that will rot. As said before, VHS might not look as good but far more reliable.

C'mon man...give me a break. I have LP's that are from 1968 and they play like a charm. my VHS tapes from 10 years ago look a little faded...but still play perfect. are dvd's disposable? they should have mentioned that earlier...dont ya think?



just any quality control team with it's head up it's yinyang. bad batches can happen anywhere and on any dvd...such is life. it's the people not giving a damn thats gonna kill it. lets face it....very few care since the new format is just around the corner. beware...the same problems will happen there.

as well it should. just dont expect industry leaders to give a shit.

I've been having pretty good luck with my titles of late. have not found one that delaminated since Bladerunner. so far.

Hi Obi! How are you doing?

To answer your question of things lasting forever, I have audio CDs more than 13 years old that play flawlessly. I have my VHS Star Wars Ep 4, 5, & 6 tapes that I bought some 8 years ago that still work beautifully. I invested in a truckload of DVDs that I am afraid will go belly up on me in time.

My Negotiator disc was not used since the one time that I popped it into my player 4 years ago. A DVD that is usused and stored properly inside a clean dry shelf inside it's own case should last, I hope.

The only consolation is that I might have to re-buy my collection when HD-DVD comes out anyways. My hope is that my DVDs last until then.

Contact had problems only in the very first batch that came out when it was first released.

Are there some discs that still cannot be copied easily? I'd love to be able to make personal copies of all my discs just in case something like this happens. I know there are issues of the originals using certain length discs that you can't find matching blanks for. And I know that copy protection on some might be difficult to get around.

only disc this has ever happened to me on is Scary Movie...course I wanted to get rid of it anyway...my Contact still plays fine...