Danny's Weblog

Yes, you can find dual-layer DVDs in Phnom Penh -- from China

In my previous posting on DVDs available in Phnom Penh, I pointed out that all the DVD copies you see are single-layer, whatever the box says. I also speculated that genuine Chinese DVDs may be available in dual-layer.

This week I experimented. There's a large Chinese-oriented DVD/CD store on the 3rd floor of the Soraya Mall at the northeast corner; it has a lot of Chinese movies, plus software with Chinese packaging. (It even has a Korean section, which I'd never noticed anywhere else in PP.)

The staff did not speak very good English, but they had heard of the term "dual layer", although they were unclear on what it meant (as indeed I would have been up till quite recently). They started off by waving boxes with a logo saying "9" at me, until I pointed out that these did not actually say "dual layer", the way the kosher labels do, and I would not believe them if they did.

Eventually they came up with what appeared to be a kosher DVD from China *of a Chinese movie* (I was assuming that like Thailand the Chicoms protect their own industry even though they allow unfettered piracy of other countries' products, much like the USA in the 18th century). I was won over because it was labelled "Region 6" – I have never seen that on any other DVD in PP, although one sees "Region 1" quite often (and it is not true). So I crossed my fingers and hoped that the "dual layer" claim was true.

I did not ask the manager (evidently Chinese) to check it, and paid 4 USD, so I felt rather foolish until I checked it and verified that it was a dual-layer – I think the capacity was 6.5 GB. (I usually don't pay more than 2 USD for a DVD, and that day I happened to buy seven DVDs at a dollar each that were quite good.)

It's called "The Music Box": www.lifeofguangzhou.com [http://www.lifeofguangzhou.com/node_10/node_35/node_109/node_266/2006/03/31/11437845481570.shtml]

There were a few more interesting elements:

1. My software actually showed it was *not* a region 6 disk; it displayed as Region 1, 2, 3... etc for apparently all regions. (It occurs to me that this may have been the *very first* disk my player has ever played which was not Region 0.)

2. Despite the extra data, and with a not very long movie, the quality was not very good. There were plenty of little specks of dirt on the image that showed it had been made from an optical print of routine theater-issue quality. I wonder if these imperfections caused a high noise floor that wasted the bitrate leaving nothing extra for the picture.

Still the image was adequate, even when zoomed in to fill the screen from the 16:9 source. Shadow detail was fair. I don't think it was simply captured from a theatrical screening.

There was one section, about two minutes long, with several read glitches. My DVD player seems to show read errors that other players don't, so I won't hold that against the DVD; however, a similar region did show up when I did a surface scan on my computer's DVD drive.

If I had to guess, I'd say it was a kosher digitization from a poor print by a service company that is inexpert. The menu system, for instance, looks more amateurish than most ripoff disks.

3. Again suggesting a theatrical print, it had Chinese and English subtitles burned onto the image; there were no separate sub tracks on the DVD. (I'm guessing the producers had US distribution in mind, and apparently there was an official DVD release in 2006-05, although I can see no reference to a theatrical run.)

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